Most dubious railway closure cases

[Doctor Fegg]

Cheaper to run, presumably? Doubt it would have done so in relation to the overall financial position [taking the of cost of capital into account] though, so not a good investment, but possibly a social one?

At this point I believe it's canonical to mention Gerry Fiennes' I Tried to Run a Railway and his view that many lines could have been saved with a "basic railway" approach, as he introduced in East Anglia.

 

[YorksLad12]

A bit like a cluster of constituencies north west of Leeds with 333’s while for most of Northern Rail Pacers are only just history.

If I read correctly, most of the Harrogate Line - Weeton to Poppleton - is Conservative Country. By your argument it should have had new stock before it did, possibly also electrification. As a fairly self-contained set of routes I don't begrudge Leeds North West getting the new trains, as the people living there kindly proved that the 'sparks effect' is real.

On-topic: Low Moor to Thornhill or Mirfield via the Spen Valley (now the Spen Valley Greenway) would have seen good patronage today if open, I think. I don't see why you would close a line that ran through the centres of the towns they served and which connected with major employment centres.

 

[Spartacus]

On-topic: Low Moor to Thornhill or Mirfield via the Spen Valley (now the Spen Valley Greenway) would have seen good patronage today if open, I think. I don't see why you would close a line that ran through the centres of the towns they served and which connected with major employment centres.

I think it would be fantastically popular today, the traffic situation up the Spen Valley is bad at the best of times, horrendous at others. I pray the light rail proposal goes ahead, I think that would be even more useful than heavy rail today.

 

[matt_world2004]

One of the silverlink lines being curtailed from Woolwich to Stratford seemed a bit dubious I would imagine there is considerable untapped demand for a Stratford service from Woolwich now.

 

[swt_passenger]

One of the silverlink lines being curtailed from Woolwich to Stratford seemed a bit dubious I would imagine there is considerable untapped demand for a Stratford service from Woolwich now.

It was effectively a conversion to DLR to allow Crossrail to use the Connaught tunnels later. Seems strategic rather than dubious.

 

[RT4038]

From what I've read, the route was well enough patronised - as evidenced by the passenger surveys undertaken by the local users group. Once the intention to close was known, passengers drifted away.

Yes, but 'well enough patronised' that could mean anything! Did the trains have an average of 100 passengers per trip - no, so the line probably lost money. I doubt the closure was dubious as defined by the OP.

It has at the time relatively new DEMU's on weekends at least, so electrification wouldn't have been vital (although has it happened at some stage, you could guarantee that the line would still be open).

But the options would have been to spend capital on buying more DEMUs to replace the expensive steam traction on weekdays and mechanise the level crossings/signalling etc or spend the money on the Bournemouth electrification project. I think they probably backed the right horse in the circumstances. I expect there would still have been an operating deficit to fund (albeit less) unless there was major housing development in the area served. Complete closure eliminated all that.

 

[ChiefPlanner]

It was effectively a conversion to DLR to allow Crossrail to use the Connaught tunnels later. Seems strategic rather than dubious.

Trust me - a 30 min frequency North Woolwich to Stratford was pretty poorly loaded , - though now with the DLR and the transformation of the area , things are a bit different......

 

[Gloster]

BR's case to close the Settle - Carlisle was rather dodgy; it was even famously undermined by the manager they sent in to manage the closure...

I understood that the attempt to close the line was scuppered by those in BR who deliberately appointed someone who they felt would have a go at making the line a success, contrary to what he was (supposedly) appointed to do. There also may have been an element of handling things in a way that would allow them to say, “It’s not quite as simple as you politicians think,” while seeming to appear willing to follow the ill thought-out knee-jerk demands of their political masters.

 

[d9009alycidon]

Glasgow to Kilmacolm in 1983. The very fact they tried to reverse it only a few short years later says it all. By that time some of the land had been sold and sadly the line only re-opened as far as Paisley Canal.

Always felt that the Elderslie Kilmacolm section was probably worth closing as the communities it served were very affluent and car orientated, however the logic of including the Paisley Canal loop baffled me as it was a handy diversionary line (it was ironcally being used for diversions on the last day of Kilmacolm services), it also stayed open as a freight line as far as Hawkhead Oil Terminal so I cannot see how it was much of a saving closing Elderslie to Hawkhead.

The direct Edinburgh Perth via Glenfarg in 1970 was another closure that was sacrificed for a Motorway, the M90.

St Andrews 1969 and (dare I say it) The Waverley Route in 1969

 

[Helvellyn]

Personally, I think some re-openings have a dubious side.

Corby branch on MML? Station only re-opened a few years ago and ELECTRIFIED now. Wires north to Leicester, Nottingham, Derby & Sheffield CANCELLED. OK, HS2 might well have a compensation factor for the latter. But surely the former is nothing to do with Corby being a marginal parliamentary seat? A bit like a cluster of constituencies north west of Leeds with 333’s while for most of Northern Rail Pacers are only just history.

Not convinced. There was an attempt to re-open the station in the late 1980s by NSE, with a Kettering-Corby DMU shuttle (some of which were extended to/from Bedford). The line itself up to Melton never shut because of freight traffic. Once Stagecoach won the East Midlands franchise in the late 2000s I think the Corby-St Pancras service was seen as a way of speeding up the longer distance services by adding a fifth train per hour the existing MML service pattern - which in itself had increased from the basic two trains per hour off-peak at privatisation. Electrification and the new half-hourly service has been about speeding up the longer distance services again (and freeing up capacity for them).

Corby has always been a marginal since the constituency was created in 1983. I'm actually surprised that there wasn't a push to extend the wires North from Bedford to Wellingborough/Kettering/Corby by NSE in the late 1980s as part of Thameslink, with InterCity perhaps using Kettering as an interchange then non-stop to/from St Pancras.




In terms of dubious closures I've wondered about Penrith-Keswick. I've heard mention that some of the route was wanted for an upgraded A66, as happened on the shores of Bassenthwaite for he Keswick-Cockermouth section. The A66 originally ended at Penrith, but was extended to the West Cumbrian coast as part of plans to make it an East-West trunk route with some new construction and some road renumbering. However, even today it's a mix of single and dual carriageway creating bottlenecks. Another factor that might have impacted it's survival, even if not explicitly stated, was West Coast electrification from Weaver Junction to Glasgow. The Keswick branch survived the construction of the M6 Penrith Bypass in 1968 (a single bridge span with footpath was built right next to the double track bridge span carrying the WCML proper over the M6 - you'd think it was all one bridge span unless you walk across on the footpath, or look up underneath!). However, with WCML electrification the formation where the branch ran in parallel with the WCML from Redhills to Penrith station became a new Down Loop line. If you still had the Keswick branch open this loop line would have been unusable whenever a Keswick service was running because platform 3 at Penrith would have been needed for the Keswick service. Even if the bay between platforms 2 and 3 were reopened, freight traffic in the loop would have blocked a departing train in, or delayed a train getting to the station from the branch. So whilst not cited as a factor in the closure the branch formation at Penrith certainly was useful for another use, i.e. as a loop for speeded up electric passenger services to overtake freight traffic - the loop was certainly well used in the 1980s and into the 1990s. The fact the line survived until 1972, just before electrification, suggests closure wasn't entirely driven by Beeching (especially given the expense of that third line over the M6 too).

 

[coppercapped]

BR's case to close the Settle - Carlisle was rather dodgy; it was even famously undermined by the manager they sent in to manage the closure...

Hmm...

Possibly the case was rather dodgy but essentially the closure proposal was a condition imposed by the Ministry of Transport in March 1970 for the approval of the Weaver Junction to Glasgow electrification project. I can't find the exact reference at the moment but the closure was foreshadowed in the British Railways Board's typescript document Route Improvements Electrification Weaver Junction to Glasgow prepared in April 1968. Part of the financial justification for the electrification was the closure of several lines in the area and the singling of the Settle and Carlisle between Skipton and Horton-in-Ribblesdale as where possible traffic would be diverted via the new electrified route at lower cost.

Two years later the 'singling' had become 'closure'.

 

[yorksrob]

Yes, but 'well enough patronised' that could mean anything! Did the trains have an average of 100 passengers per trip - no, so the line probably lost money. I doubt the closure was dubious as defined by the OP.


But the options would have been to spend capital on buying more DEMUs to replace the expensive steam traction on weekdays and mechanise the level crossings/signalling etc or spend the money on the Bournemouth electrification project. I think they probably backed the right horse in the circumstances. I expect there would still have been an operating deficit to fund (albeit less) unless there was major housing development in the area served. Complete closure eliminated all that.

I don't know, the 1959 passenger survey recorded 12675 over one week in summer, which translates to 1800 a day. So whilst not 100 a train it certainly wasn't carting fresh air.

Like many of the slightly later routes, I don't think the line had many level crossings - possibly none at all. It's also worth noting that 1966 is around the time that the late Ron Cotton was saving stopping services between Reading and Tonbridge with the introduction of the hybrid tadpole units (Hastings motor car, Hastings trailer, EPB driving trailer) so it wasn't beyond the realms possibility for something to have been put together for minimal capital.

 

[ChiefPlanner]

Hmm...

Possibly the case was rather dodgy but essentially the closure proposal was a condition imposed by the Ministry of Transport in March 1970 for the approval of the Weaver Junction to Glasgow electrification project. I can't find the exact reference at the moment but the closure was foreshadowed in the British Railways Board's typescript document Route Improvements Electrification Weaver Junction to Glasgow prepared in April 1968. Part of the financial justification for the electrification was the closure of several lines in the area and the singling of the Settle and Carlisle between Skipton and Horton-in-Ribblesdale as where possible traffic would be diverted via the new electrified route at lower cost.

Two years later the 'singling' had become 'closure'.

I think there is a lot more to it than "BR Policy" - there was a particular individual at the then old DfT who had an issue with closures generally , but an alliance within BR and others gently pushed the closure into the background and a pragmatic "saving" was done. Read the Marylebone closure thread and comments in the excellent "London Reconnections" website - warning , it is a very long read........(but very interesting)

Anyway - a pet one of mine , - Brynamman East - Swansea St Thomas - (Swansea Vale, Midland and LMS) - 1950 - hugely profitable in the glory years before the sky fell in after WW1 , (more passengers than the entire Midland suburban service into St Pancras and Moorgate) , but dead really after that. Worked by a 3F tank and a 2 car push pull set. Not even hourly by 1948.

Closure proposed on the basis of something like 20 new passenger coaches needed and a similar raft of "new" steam engines. Nodded through with no consultation and with full support from the 3 local bus operators - which had snatched the traffic. An easy case , - but a bit devious in hamming up the railway resource case. Not that the bus windfall lasted much beyond say 1964 or so. (when the freight service went in any case as industry had by then gone)

 

[Dr Hoo]

Over the years, we’ve seen many rail closure cases which seem quite dubious, maybe even where the closure case is founded on insecure, made up or even “engineered” evidence. By way of example, take the 1982 closure of the March to Spalding line, where the timetable seemed to be designed to positively discourage use. Just three trains a day, and with “connections” timed to miss! I think there was a train from Cambridge which arrived at Spalding around 1219, with the northward service to Lincoln having left a minute earlier.

There have been many examples of manufactured closure cases – what are the worst examples we can think of?

To get back to the beginning, March-Spalding was a good example of adapting services to modern needs.

The 'Joint Line' had had a very limited services after the 1970 Lincolnshire closures. Hardly anyone wanted to go to March as such. The main stations had 'one change' routes to London or the rest of the ECML (Gainsborough-Retford, Lincoln-Newark, Sleaford-Grantham and Spalding-Peterborough). So changing twice, at Spalding and Peterborough, was never going to be attractive. The Peterborough-Spalding service had rather an odd status, with local authority subsidy rather than being part of the 'PSO', so was obviously focussed on local needs and connections rather than through journeys.

The Spalding-March route was of value whilst there was significant slow freight to Whitemoor Yard but this had largely evaporated and the line had loads of level crossings with high expenses. Diverting and combining the Joint Line services to Peterborough made both commercial and operating sense and frequencies gradually built up from three-per-day in subsequent years.

(I had strong family connections in Spalding and even lived there for a while so know the area quite well.)

Glasgow to Kilmacolm in 1983. The very fact they tried to reverse it only a few short years later says it all. By that time some of the land had been sold and sadly the line only re-opened as far as Paisley Canal.

This was a case where the local Passenger Transport Authority/Executive exercised its right to terminate support for a route. People on this Forum are often very keen on localism and services being specified by locally elected politicians with a strong social agenda but in the Kilmacolm case they decided that buses would be cheaper. (Other routes that PTA/Es declined to support included Birmingham Snow Hill-Wolverhampton Low Level, Clayton West and Hunts Cross-Gateacre.) Strathclyde PTE agreed to the land sale.

 

[30mog]

If I read correctly, most of the Harrogate Line - Weeton to Poppleton - is Conservative Country. By your argument it should have had new stock before it did, possibly also electrification. As a fairly self-contained set of routes I don't begrudge Leeds North West getting the new trains, as the people living there kindly proved that the 'sparks effect' is real.

On-topic: Low Moor to Thornhill or Mirfield via the Spen Valley (now the Spen Valley Greenway) would have seen good patronage today if open, I think. I don't see why you would close a line that ran through the centres of the towns they served and which connected with major employment centres.

“If I read correctly, most of the Harrogate Line - Weeton to Poppleton - is Conservative Country. By your argument it should have had new stock before it did, possibly also electrification.”

No, my contention is. Marginal seats seem to do well for rail improvements to help the incumbent MP hold on at next election. I am well aware the Harrogate line is safe Conservative country meaning it would in fact be overlooked. Same applies to anywhere around Liverpool, for example, for being safe Labour.

 

[Diplodicus]

Somerset & Dorset {shafted by BR(W)}

 

[Rescars]

A big problem with all of these closures has been the loss of the right of way. If this had been preserved, it would now be so much easier for the current generation to reverse the decisions of their predecessors, whatever their rights or wrongs.

 

[Bletchleyite]

A big problem with all of these closures has been the loss of the right of way. If this had been preserved, it would now be so much easier for the current generation to reverse the decisions of their predecessors, whatever their rights or wrongs.

This is certainly a big benefit of cycleway conversions (or even road conversions like the Caernarfon tunnel). OK, Sustrans will shout if there is a need to convert back (see the thread on the Monsall Trail), but it's a heck of a lot easier than when you've got people living in houses built on the trackbed.

 

[Pinza-C55]

I spoke to a guard on the Bishop Auckland branch in the early 80s and he said he worked the trains to Crook and that the traffic surveys were only done when they knew traffic was light and that in fact the daytime trains were well patronised.

 

[simonw]

Somerset & Dorset {shafted by BR(W)}

A line that should never have been built, more like.

 

[Dr Hoo]

I spoke to a guard on the Bishop Auckland branch in the early 80s and he said he worked the trains to Crook and that the traffic surveys were only done when they knew traffic was light and that in fact the daytime trains were well patronised.

It only made sense for all the traffic surveys (for passenger and freight) that underpinned the Re-shaping Report to be carried out simultaneously. This was during the third week of April 1961. Dr Beeching took over as Chairman of the then British Transport Commission on 1 June and the results were (metaphorically) waiting for him although it took another 21 months to come up with the report.

I know that it is a popular myth that Beeching somehow turned up at each of thousands of stations on a wet Tuesday evening in February but there has never been any serious evidence that the methodology was fiddled within the obvious constraints of the time - all paper based, no computers or automatic data capture and so on.

 

[leytongabriel]

I seem to remember a publication entitled 'The Great Isle of Wight Train Robbery' which detailed how BR had messed with the figures to justify closing everything except Ryde-Shanklin. And yes Ventnor was up a hill........

And another trick was not posting up any timetables wasn't it, as happened on the Stour Valley line to reduce passenger numbers nicely.

 

[Gloster]

Although there was a lot of criticism of BR for carrying out its traffic surveys in what could be seen as a quiet period, it had one (possibly unintended) advantage. If they had carried out the survey in a busy period, they would have had quite a number of lines that would appear profitable (or at least worth retaining) on the figures produced, but were really basket cases. As it was beginning to become clear that the car was starting to eat into the number of passenger journeys, you had a situation where lines that appeared profitable when surveyed had a chance of remaining so for a number of years.

 

[Falcon1200]

Always felt that the Elderslie Kilmacolm section was probably worth closing as the communities it served were very affluent and car orientated, however the logic of including the Paisley Canal loop baffled me as it was a handy diversionary line (it was ironcally being used for diversions on the last day of Kilmacolm services), it also stayed open as a freight line as far as Hawkhead Oil Terminal so I cannot see how it was much of a saving closing Elderslie to Hawkhead.

I agree; It always seemed wrong to me that what were in effect two separate routes were treated as one, just because that was how the train service operated. The Canal line would indeed have been invaluable for diversions to this day, and especially when the additional line between Shields Jc and Paisley was being installed. Even more silly than closing Elderslie/Hawkhead was allowing housing to obstruct the trackbed just beyond Paisley Canal !

This was a case where the local Passenger Transport Authority/Executive exercised its right to terminate support for a route.

Sadly yes, and IIRC as part of a larger dispute over financing between BR and Strathclyde PTE, which as well as the Canal and Kilmacolm closures led to the Strathclyde Manning Agreement, AKA DOO.

 

[Ianno87]

But was this closure 'founded on insecure, made up or even “engineered” evidence', as per the OP? I don't think so. Was the line losing money at the time - undoubtedly.

I'd say wilfully ignoring a major source of potential new demand fits the criteria of "engineered".

 

[30907]

I'd say wilfully ignoring a major source of potential new demand fits the criteria of "engineered".

But I thought 60s New Towns like MK were supposed to be relatively self-contained, not generate inwards commuting? How long did it take for MKC to be built?

 

[Ianno87]

But I thought 60s New Towns like MK were supposed to be relatively self-contained, not generate inwards commuting? How long did it take for MKC to be built?

Didn't work out like that. It only took until 1982 for Milton Keynes Central to be built to connect it to the outside world, once planners figured out that no town or city can be truly self-contained.

 

[Rescars]

It only made sense for all the traffic surveys (for passenger and freight) that underpinned the Re-shaping Report to be carried out simultaneously. This was during the third week of April 1961. Dr Beeching took over as Chairman of the then British Transport Commission on 1 June and the results were (metaphorically) waiting for him although it took another 21 months to come up with the report.

I know that it is a popular myth that Beeching somehow turned up at each of thousands of stations on a wet Tuesday evening in February but there has never been any serious evidence that the methodology was fiddled within the obvious constraints of the time - all paper based, no computers or automatic data capture and so on.

But Beeching was appointed by a minister who had more than a passing interest in constructing motorways......

 

[30907]

Didn't work out like that. It only took until 1982 for Milton Keynes Central to be built to connect it to the outside world, once planners figured out that no town or city can be truly self-contained.

I know. And that was for the obvious traffic flows. My point is that in the mid 60s the planners weren't anticipating major passenger flows developing Cambridge-Bletchley for MK or Oxford-MK (and Oxford-Cambridge justified just 2 coaches a day via Aylesbury and Hitchin).

 

[Railwaysceptic]

A line that should never have been built, more like.

Somerset was once a coal-producing area. The railway around Radstock was busy with coal trains. When the Somerset coal industry faded away, so did the justification of the Somerset & Dorset Railway.

But Beeching was appointed by a minister who had more than a passing interest in constructing motorways......

So what? How did closing very minor branch lines generate more motorway building contracts for Ernest Marples?