What if the Beeching Act never happened?

[charlee]

Had the Beeching act not occured. What would be the state of the rail network in the UK at this moment in time. Would the lines marked for closure still have closed or do you feel some lines would still be operating today?

Was it a nessecary process in order to save the railways do you think?

I was looking at Beeching Mark II and if that was ever given the go ahead certain parts of the country would be serverly lacking in investment and economy. Places such as North Scotland, Cumbria, Majority of Wales and Cornwall would have suffered and been hard to reach. So its good it didnt!


I feel that certain Rural areas where road links are still bad would have kept there rail links. And certain lines should not have been axed such as the Argyle and Varsity lines. However that with the domination of roads that closure of most railways in Britian were always going to happen sooner or later.

 

[Nym]

It should be noted that Beeching MkII so to speak was a list of lines that should have significant levels of investment, not the only lines in the UK that should remain. Other than that, I don't think anyone can reliabily predict what would have happened.

If a better railbus had been available to run branchlines, rather than close them, perhaps a lot would still be left...

 

[charlee]

It should be noted that Beeching MkII so to speak was a list of lines that should have significant levels of investment, not the only lines in the UK that should remain. Other than that, I don't think anyone can reliabily predict what would have happened.

If a better railbus had been available to run branchlines, rather than close them, perhaps a lot would still be left...

Ahhh! I thought what i was reading was really weird. I misread it sorry. Prob confusing with Serpell

 

[MidnightFlyer]

If Beeching had never happened it would probably have got a lot worse - we couldn't go on funding branchlines that were losing money almost by the hour. I think some lines should never have closed, but I don't really knock him for some of the other closures.

 

[exile]

Had Beeching concluded, as he could have done given the evidence, that there was no possible rail network that would be viable, the Government may have decided to close it down at once or at least let it wither away, closing lines as infrastructure renewals became due and also not replacing time-expired rolling stock. The whole rail system would probably have closed by about 1980.

 

[swt_passenger]

Usually referred to as the 'Beeching Axe' surely?

 

[Gareth Marston]

If Beeching had never happened it would probably have got a lot worse - we couldn't go on funding branchlines that were losing money almost by the hour. I think some lines should never have closed, but I don't really knock him for some of the other closures.

If branch lines were the root cause of BRBs losses in the early 60's then why did closing them not make the rump profitable?

 

[tbtc]

If branch lines were the root cause of BRBs losses in the early 60's then why did closing them not make the rump profitable?

Making the "rump" less-loss-making would at least have been a step in the right direction.

 

[yorksrob]

I suppose an equally interesting question could be "what if Government had decided to account for, and pay for socially necessary services earlier".

 

[Gareth Marston]

Making the "rump" less-loss-making would at least have been a step in the right direction.

The losses by the end of the Sixty's were higher after the closures then they were before.

 

[Polarbear]

If branch lines were the root cause of BRBs losses in the early 60's then why did closing them not make the rump profitable?

Although many branch lines weren't profitable in their own right, they also acted as feeders to the main trunk routes. Beeching's premise was that people would drive to the nearest main line station & get the train for the "profitable" bit of the journey.

In reality, with the expansion of the motorway network & improvements in cars, people started to drive all the way to their destinations, thus making the main lines less profitable than they would have been.

Of course, this has come home to roost now as the road network is at capacity in many urban areas & people are retuning to use the rail network.

 

[Gareth Marston]

I suppose an equally interesting question could be "what if Government had decided to account for, and pay for socially necessary services earlier".

BRB's losses were 17% in 1960 the UK has been subsidising the "private sector" at a rate of 50% in recent years. McNulty could only dream of 17%!

The big factors in BRB's losses were not branch lines and stopping services anyway. Rising labor costs combined with a failure to modernise meaning it was still awash with labor were one of them. However the failure to modernise was mainly down to Govt policy. The common carrier status for freight was a millstone the Big 4 lobbied to get removed unsuccessfully before the war. Yet govt insisted the railways continued to carry small load traffic at a huge loss with no subsidy.

 

[Markdvdman]

BRB's losses were 17% in 1960 the UK has been subsidising the "private sector" at a rate of 50% in recent years. McNulty could only dream of 17%!

The big factors in BRB's losses were not branch lines and stopping services anyway. Rising labor costs combined with a failure to modernise meaning it was still awash with labor were one of them. However the failure to modernise was mainly down to Govt policy. The common carrier status for freight was a millstone the Big 4 lobbied to get removed unsuccessfully before the war. Yet govt insisted the railways continued to carry small load traffic at a huge loss with no subsidy.

The 'Modernisation' plan earlier set the stall for it.

If they had realised that many branch lines could have run on a service with no manned stations etc they would have been able to run them for peanuts!

Administered badly, and sadly, a LOT of those lines lost would have been a godsend in this gridlocked age! Profits on the railway are not easy due to running regular services. Peak services are profitable but then FGW HST trains rarely chek tickets. Checking is not done well at times but I understand it is not easy.

Even now we cannot find a correct answer.

However, a lot of branch lines lost may have made it easier to administer now.

We will never know sadly!

 

[CosherB]

BR closed many lines long after Beeching - Midland main line through the Peak, for instance, and they tried very hard to close the Settle Carlisle. BR were more of a threat to the integrity of the network than was Beeching with his axing of hopelessly uneconomical branches.

Those who wish for re-nationalisation should think on this....

 

[yorksrob]

BR closed many lines long after Beeching - Midland main line through the Peak, for instance, and they tried very hard to close the Settle Carlisle. BR were more of a threat to the integrity of the network than was Beeching with his axing of hopelessly uneconomical branches.

Those who wish for re-nationalisation should think on this....

Beeching was BR for a time - and he represented probably the worst aspect of BR management - inflexible and forever searching for a mythical profitable "core" network that could exist on its own. Line closures had been going on since the 1920's and would have carried on with or without him. Would BR have used the same criteria to declare lines as "unprofitable" such as the infamous York - Hull via Market Weighton case study ?

Possibly not, but it has to be remembered that a lot of routes closed later also appeared on the list.

Only sectorised BR delivered a stable and expanding network, passenger growth and control of public subsidy. Not Beeching era BR and not the privatised railway.

 

[Mutant Lemming]

Those who wish for re-nationalisation should think on this....

Isn't the track effectively 'nationalised' ?

Aren't we, as taxpayers, susidising the rail network at a greater rate per capita then we ever were in BR days ?

Is a disjointed network with a myriad of fares requiring a degree to understand them really better ?

Won't we, as taxpayers, be funding the major infrastructure improvements (such as HS2) ?

 

[mallard]

Won't we, as taxpayers, be funding the major infrastructure improvements (such as HS2) ?

It's worse than that, "we" effectively pay for everything twice these days. It goes something like this:

1. Taxpayers pay to build/improve something.
2. The government sells it (for far less than it cost to build).
3. Taxpayers then lease it back (usually via subsidies to TOCs) from the company it was sold to!

Going back to Beeching, it was clear that some parts of the rail network were completely non-viable by the 1960s, but it's also true that significant savings could have been made without so widespread closures. Cheaper to operate rolling stock (early railbusses were really only a failure because they lost places to run and because buying them from Germany was still politically difficult so soon after WW2), more efficient operations, some track rationalisation could have saved many lines.

Unfortunately, the only cost-cutting measure really considered by Beeching was "closure".

 

[TDK]

Had the Beeching act not occured. What would be the state of the rail network in the UK at this moment in time. Would the lines marked for closure still have closed or do you feel some lines would still be operating today?

Was it a nessecary process in order to save the railways do you think?

I was looking at Beeching Mark II and if that was ever given the go ahead certain parts of the country would be serverly lacking in investment and economy. Places such as North Scotland, Cumbria, Majority of Wales and Cornwall would have suffered and been hard to reach. So its good it didnt!


I feel that certain Rural areas where road links are still bad would have kept there rail links. And certain lines should not have been axed such as the Argyle and Varsity lines. However that with the domination of roads that closure of most railways in Britian were always going to happen sooner or later.

If the Beeching act had never happened it would have been called something else as it would have been just a matter of time before the said lines were closed. It is historically known that what Beeching did improved the railways not ruined them.

 

[Greenback]

The big factors in BRB's losses were not branch lines and stopping services anyway. Rising labor costs combined with a failure to modernise meaning it was still awash with labor were one of them. However the failure to modernise was mainly down to Govt policy. The common carrier status for freight was a millstone the Big 4 lobbied to get removed unsuccessfully before the war. Yet govt insisted the railways continued to carry small load traffic at a huge loss with no subsidy.

BR and Beeching get a lot of criticism when all they were doing was implementing government policy. It was government who refused to remove common carrier status, it was government who decided the railways must pay their way. They brought in Dr Beeching to do it.

Beeching was BR for a time - and he represented probably the worst aspect of BR management - inflexible and forever searching for a mythical profitable "core" network that could exist on its own. Line closures had been going on since the 1920's and would have carried on with or without him. Would BR have used the same criteria to declare lines as "unprofitable" such as the infamous York - Hull via Market Weighton case study ?

Possibly not, but it has to be remembered that a lot of routes closed later also appeared on the list.

Only sectorised BR delivered a stable and expanding network, passenger growth and control of public subsidy. Not Beeching era BR and not the privatised railway.

I agree.

Going back to Beeching, it was clear that some parts of the rail network were completely non-viable by the 1960s, but it's also true that significant savings could have been made without so widespread closures. Cheaper to operate rolling stock (early railbusses were really only a failure because they lost places to run and because buying them from Germany was still politically difficult so soon after WW2), more efficient operations, some track rationalisation could have saved many lines.

Unfortunately, the only cost-cutting measure really considered by Beeching was "closure".

You are correct. There were quite a few lines or routes that were built for traffic that simply no longer existed. Other lines, though, were closed when they could have survived with drastically reduced operating costs.

In fairness to BR, they did do this on some lines, but it was still deemed insufficient and eventually they closed too. With hindsight, we can see that this was a mistake, but that was then and this is now.

 

[exile]

It should be pointed out that if the constraints Beeching was working under were to be applied today the entire network would be shut down - never mind the ones that Serpell tried to apply! Basically, every £ earned through fares and freight revenue has to be matched by another £ from the taxpayer. Whether the benefits in terms of environment, reduced journey times and reduced congestion are worth £6 billion a year is something the Government must be seriously questioning.

 

[stockport1]

there were many cost cutting schemes that could have been implemented or factored in(steam locos).

1. Steam was being phased out. - massive costs associated with steam
2. More unmanned stations - as mentiond in a previous post
3. *certain* closures made sence - winsford and over branch for example.

the running down or rail was a prelude/prerequisite to closing down the uk coal and then steel and other uk manufacturing industries.
how much cheaper is a coal train to 50 hgvs?

currently we are in the final phases of the looting. whats left of our train builders is off to germany/japan and china...with the complicity of the government

 

[Gareth Marston]

You cant look at Beeching without going back to the birth of the railways and looking at the influence of Govt decisions over time. This was actually said to a Conservative MP who started going on about the high cost of railways a few years ago - "well if you buggers hadn't privatized and fragmented it it wouldn't cost so much and we would have had a more sensible network built in the first place if your great great grandfather had actually planned the rail network instead of taking bribes from promoters". The railways are a product of two century's of political/govt decisions.

Of course the Tory's of the late 50's/early 60's were heavily funded by the road lobby and had personal interest in its expansion, the railways were an obstacle. Though the cost time bomb had already been planted some decades before. Maybe a genuine look at costs could have been done without the anti rail attitude that pervaded government at the time, many posters have put up robust suggestions.

 

[CosherB]

Won't we, as taxpayers, be funding the major infrastructure improvements (such as HS2) ?

Yes of course - just as we funded the M1, M6, M25 etc. Who else is going to invest in the country's infrastructure but the taxpayer? Motorways and railways don't make direct financial returns on their investment that will cover their costs (motorways of course generate no direct income whereas HS2 will reap income from fares). The pay-back for these projects is indirect - improved transport links stimulates industry and allows wealth-generation that couldn't take place if we still relied on muddy cart tracks and narrow canals.

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

It was already too late when Beeching arrived.
BR had sat on it hands for more than a decade, and when a fairy godmother gave them a fortune to modernise in 1955, they wasted the opportunity.

Beeching at least got some commercial sense into BR and began to build a strategy (liner trains etc).
Babies were indeed thrown out with the bathwater, but BR had no policy to reduce costs until push came to shove.
Their only directive from the Government was to "break even, taking one year with another". What a mission statement.
When the roof fell in around 1959, they had no solutions.

To my mind the best Beeching solution to the cost problem was where most local stations were closed but the line itself survived, if in reduced form (eg the North Wales and Cambrian main lines).
Journeys then became much faster and traffic began to build again on a much reduced cost base.
But for most branch and many secondary lines, where services had barely changed since 1914, it was too late.

 

[Gareth Marston]

It was already too late when Beeching arrived.
BR had sat on it hands for more than a decade, and when a fairy godmother gave them a fortune to modernise in 1955, they wasted the opportunity.

One of the big criticisms of the modernization plan was the hump marshaling yards designed for transit of and small load wagons- a traffic that was forced on the railways by common carrier status. When the yards were complete in the mid 60's the common carrier status had been removed and they were redundant. Was that BR's fault or Govt?

 

[LNW-GW Joint]

One of the big criticisms of the modernization plan was the hump marshaling yards designed for transit of and small load wagons- a traffic that was forced on the railways by common carrier status. When the yards were complete in the mid 60's the common carrier status had been removed and they were redundant. Was that BR's fault or Govt?

Well I think BR did not know the true cost of carrying particular traffic, and just threw money at perceived pinch points. It was this sort of policy which gave us white elephants like the Bletchley flyover and Perth marshalling yard.
"Solving yesterday's problems with tomorrow's money" is how it has been described.
I don't think the steam-diesel conversion programme was BR's finest hour either.

I am not sure of the impact of common carrier status. BR didn't seem to make any effort to reduce the wagonload network, and that drove a lot of the cost (yards, shunters, signal boxes, crossovers etc).

BR had ideas, but not the time to put them into effect before Marples pulled the plug.

 

[Bittern]

I've said it before, and it'll say it again: the real failure of the Beeching era wasn't the closures of the lines, it was the failure to protect the trackbeds of the lines, especially the secondary lines such as the Waverley Route.

Over in France, the SNCF mothball the lines they close (perhaps not all) so they won't be built over. How that wasn't done over here is what the real mistake was. The only case I can think of on this side is the former Maryhill Central station which has a supermarket standing on it, but the supermarket owners (Tesco?) have been instructed to leave enough space for the station. Most of the line is underground and the tunnels remain, but the problem is the rest of the line which is overground has been lost!

Another thing: How on earth did they come to the conclusion that people would drive to their nearest railhead instead of just driving all the way? Even when I try to shake hindsight to attempt to see it from their POV, that makes absolutely no sense.

 

[Spaceflower]

...because it was buses which initially started competing with the railway, not cars.

 

[swt_passenger]

...it was the failure to unprotect the trackbeds of the lines, especially the secondary lines such as the Waverley Route.

Presumably you really meant the 'failure to protect'?

 

[Bittern]

I don't know what you're on about...>_>

*Magically makes typo disappear*