The Bristol Railway Archive

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/8099912.stm

To me this raises the question, would 40 years of mothball maintenance have been cheaper than the cost of ripping up and relaying. Is Richard Beeching's policy of ripping up the lines in the end going to cost the railway a lot more than he ever saved them.

I have been having an "electronic natter" about this all day on the Semg forum. My view is that, in general and for all sorts of reasons, many of these schemes are not going to get off the ground.

Somebody over there has done a few cost-benefit calculations, and the figures do not look too good.

We are aware locally of the fuss that Sustrans kick up whenever a proposal is made to relay or re-use in some other way the Bristol-Mangotsfield trackbed. Many of the proposals being made (like re-serving Cranleigh in Sussex and Ringwood in Hants) are on formations that have also been turned into cycle paths. Sustrans will be equally as vocal there as they are in Bristol. Ironic isn't it - a sustainable transport organisation objecting to sustainable transport!

Add to that NIMBYism, changes of political colour in government etc, and I suspect that many of these ideas will simply not get off the ground.

Think also of what happend about proposals to reopen Corsham and Wootton Bassett stations - scuppered by the railway industry itself!

They ran an item on this very matter of the Jeremy Vine show on radio 2 this morning, and a guy was interviewed who has been campaigning to get the lines to Blyth and Ashington in Northumberland reopened for passengers.

Reopening freight only lines that are still in situ is one thing, rebuilding long dismantled railways is another matter altogether.

horace wrote:http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/8099912.stm

To me this raises the question, would 40 years of mothball maintenance have been cheaper than the cost of ripping up and relaying. Is Richard Beeching's policy of ripping up the lines in the end going to cost the railway a lot more than he ever saved them.

What Beeching (and probably more pertinently, the accountant around at the time - was it Philip Shirley?) did at the time was to respond to the perceived situation. This was:

1. The railways were losing a fortune in the financial terms of the day.
2. They were no longer needed as people turned more to road transport for both passenger and freight.

No-one would have thought about mothballing at the time because railways were seen as yesterday's form of transport.

Railway management were primarily to blame for letting this situation develop in the first place (ably assisted of course by governments of both persuasions, and especially so since nationalisation) by running the railway in the way it had always been run, with perhaps scant regard to the true needs of the travelling public.

Take a local example - the S&D. Much has been said about the Western deliberately running the line down in order to close it but, if you look at the S&D service in the July 1922 Bradshaw reprint, and compare it to the "service" being provided when the through passenger services were withdrawn in 1962, you find you are looking at virtually the same timetable. The WR didn't do that - they simply allowed the archaic system to continue.

Bath to Bournemouth trains having 20-30 minutes waiting connections at Templecombe. 3 hours plus "par for the course" for the journey (average speed 24mph). Royal Blue coaches would take you there in two and a quarter hours (I know - I used them once!).

Never mind having a compartment to yourself - by 1964 you could have a coach to yourself! Passenger receipts weren't even covering the engine's coal bill!

And this was being repeated all over the country. It couldn't be allowed to go on, and it wouldn't be allowed to go on if it was happening now, either.

(A pro-Beeching post usually gets people's keyboards red hot, so I'll stop now and see what happens)

Railway management were primarily to blame for letting this situation develop in the first place (ably assisted of course by governments of both persuasions, and especially so since nationalisation) by running the railway in the way it had always been run, with perhaps scant regard to the true needs of the travelling public.

I blame the governments more than the railway management. The railway management were not given much incentive to improve the railways after the war, where as in most of Europe the railways were seen as the backbone of the nation. In Britain it just did not seem to enter the heads of the politicians that the priority for sustained development should be the infrastructure. A mental problem that still seems to haunt politicians to this day. For us train spotters it was great, non standardisation meant such a huge variety of rolling stick, but logistically a night mare. Once it was decided that we did need a modern transport system it was to late, the minister of transport was a road builder, well he did have a little bias to his thinking!!
But i do and have always wondered what sort of long term view was taken on the transport needs of the country. I suspect at the time 20 years was considered a long time after all it was the 60's 20 years before that was prewar, so 20 years in the future was unimaginable. This again is something we still suffer from, long term planning is for decades only. thank goodness the Victorians took a longer view, where would London be today without Bazalgette's sewers that were designed to last hundreds of years. I just think that what happened and what is being suggested now is a classic example of what happens when politicians control an engineering problem, not engineers.


What has intrigued me about the suggestions that were made is how does one open the line to Brixham without taking the Paington steam railway back into public ownership, a slight problem there i think.

The full report is here:

http://www.atoc.org/general/ConnectingC ... rt_S10.pdf

I too have been having a detailed look at the report this evening, and it is clear from the "further action" list on page 12 that this report is, in truth, little more than a wish-list at this stage. The further action list and its preamble is repeated below:

"Once a decision has been made to proceed with a project, depending on complexity, the planning timescale under the new process typically could be:

1. Route planning and optioneering - one to two years

2. Consultation - six to nine months

3. Determination of Development Order application - three to fifteen months

4. Mobilisation, construction, testing, commissioning - one to two years.

. Total - 2.75 to six years."

Admittedly the appendices (pages 17 to 20) include some rudimentary costings but, as "route planning and optioneering" has yet to be done, their accuracy is likely to be akin to that of a chimpanzee with an abacus. I could also say that the timescales shown in points 1 to 4 above might also be a little optimistic, and indeed their choice of words at the end of the preamble seem to support this view!

Just a quick look at some examples. The proposal to provide a new station at Grove to pick up Wantage traffic ignores the fact that, already, plans to reopen Corsham and Wotton Bassett stations (on the same line) were scuppered by the railway companies themselves who wanted the paths for HSTs, when the vey useful Bristol to Oxford direct services that would have provided the trains for these stations were withdrawn some years ago.

In the case of Portishead, this one has been rumbling on for some years, as the residents of the new development there were supposed to have been"promised" a rail service that has yet to materialise. Although the track is still in situ, somebody in their infinite wisdom has erected a 3 metre high fence at at least one point on the formation, with the track still in existence underneath it!

I for one shall believe that this report is the precursor to a railway revival when I see action and not just words.

horace wrote:

Robin Summerhill wrote:Railway management were primarily to blame for letting this situation develop in the first place (ably assisted of course by governments of both persuasions, and especially so since nationalisation) by running the railway in the way it had always been run, with perhaps scant regard to the true needs of the travelling public.

I blame the governments more than the railway management. The railway management were not given much incentive to improve the railways after the war, where as in most of Europe the railways were seen as the backbone of the nation. In Britain it just did not seem to enter the heads of the politicians that the priority for sustained development should be the infrastructure. ...

... But i do and have always wondered what sort of long term view was taken on the transport needs of the country. I suspect at the time 20 years was considered a long time after all it was the 60's 20 years before that was prewar, so 20 years in the future was unimaginable. This again is something we still suffer from, long term planning is for decades only.

Last point first - political "long term planning" in this country very rarely extends beyond the next election!

Now the railway point. When you look back at the accountancy arrangements that were in place at the time, it is astonishing now to see that there was nobody charged with looking at both income and expenditure at "grass roots" level.

Going back to the S&D to illustrate the point, it was not unknown for the Commercial department to lay on excursions from Bristol and Bath to Bournemouth. They may well have filled a 10 coach train with customers, but their remit did not extend to the costs of providing the service. So, whilst they might have sent a full train to the coast, the accountancy system did not let them know how much it cost to send the thing there ie. engine fuel bill, staff costs etc, so they could not know whether it made any money. Should they send that train down on a Sunday, then the line would have to be opened for the day, with all staff being paid time and three quarters. How many passenger fares would be needed to pay for all the staff that would have been specially brought into work on tht day?

It will be seen, therefore, that a full train is not in itself a guarantee of profitability.

Thre surveys that were carried out under Beeching in April 1961 sought to address this issue. You can argue all you like (as many have done now for 48 years) that the surveys were flawed/ biased/ inaccurate, and I have to agree that there were some lines that might have been seen in a better light had the figures been a better reflection of the true position but, in general terms, the outcome (the Beeching Report) was one that simply had to be done at the time.

There were, of course, a lot of assumptions made that seem plain stupid with the benefit of hindsight, like the idea that people would drive/ take the bus to their local railhead after the closure of their local station and catch the train from there. But they only seem stupid with that 20-20 hindsight - they didn't seem that stupid at the time.

Just a final example. It has often been argued that the Kemble - Cirencester service was indeed profitable but it was so easily grouped with the loss making Kemble - Tetbury service that it was closed anyway. However, with the Tetbury branch gone, and the single units to operate the Cirencester line having to bear the full costs of their operation (including running to Swindon for servicing etc), would it still have been profitable?

Just a final PS, referring back to a couple of posts ago. Yes, the accountant was Phillip Shirley, and I am quite happy to write a couple of weighty tomes on here about his antics if anybody is interested"

Yes, the accountant was Phillip Shirley, and I am quite happy to write a couple of weighty tomes on here about his antics if anybody is interested"

Yes please. I'd be interested to know his thinking at the time - and if you know of it, it would be good to have it recorded here on the net for posterity and for all to see and read.

jules wrote:

Robin Summerhill wrote:Yes, the accountant was Phillip Shirley, and I am quite happy to write a couple of weighty tomes on here about his antics if anybody is interested"

Yes please. I'd be interested to know his thinking at the time - and if you know of it, it would be good to have it recorded here on the net for posterity and for all to see and read.

In response to this request, I have been trawling through my book archives and the internet, collecting what information I can on Phillip Shirley. It appears that modern technology has (so far) by and large overlooked him, because there is remarkably little on the man who probably did more than Beeching himself to take the railway apart (literally) in the early 1960s.

ShirleyÆs main predilection was in the efficient use of assets. Whilst Beeching dealt with the closures, ShirleyÆs eye was more on ôrationalisationö eg. ôWhy have a double track main line when all the traffic can fit onto one? Then we can reuse the redundant track elsewhere or sell it for scrapö

Most of the following paragraphs come from a book ôBeeching û Champion of the Railway?ö by R H N Hardy, printed in 1989 ISBN 0 7110 1855 3

From Hardy ôBeeching û Champion of the Railway?ö

In October 1961 Shirley burst onto the scene and we had never seen anybody like him. An Australian who spoke with an English accent and an accountant, he was seconded by Unilever although he never returned, and they say that Unilever rubbed its hands when Beeching snapped him up. This could have been so but he joined the BRB primarily to handle financial matters and this he certainly did and a great deal more. From 1958 he had been Chairman of BatchelorÆs peas and a Stratford driver was reputed to have remarked: ôFirst we get a chemist and now we get some bleeder who put peas in cans!ö

ShirleyÆs influence spread to every corner of the railway, to every department. He told the management they were not fit to manage, and he abhorred the use of the term ôrailwayman.ö He was feared and disliked and he was the last person to worry about that. He asked questions, he criticised, nothing escaped his attention at grass roots level.

If one looks at BeechingÆs first Board of 1963, one sees the name of Shirley on most of the main Headquarters Committees û Management Staff; Supply (Chairman); Finance (Chairman); Technical; Workshops and Works & Equipment.

Shirley made management think of costs, of the value of assets, of the need for people to be aware of the financial effects of those decisions that the management had so readily taken. He remodelled the Finance and the Supplies & Contracts departments. He operated at every level and crossed many normal lines of communication, creating a great deal of unnecessary work in the process. To stand up to Shirley was an ordeal, but it was rewarding if one was master of the subject. If not, it was curtains.

He was the perfect foil for Beeching, two men dissimilar in almost every sense. It could be said that it was not a Board MemberÆs job to belabour the Road Motor Foreman at Holloway on the value of his stores when he could have been attending to matters of policy and seeing that others met his requirements.

At the time when Beeching was getting the feel of the railway, Shirley was already beginning to be known as a breaker of idols.

In 1964 the deficit had reduced from a 1962 peak of ú104 million to ú68.5 million. A capital expenditure of ú108 million had been financed very largely from depreciation provision and the disposal of property and scrap material (Shirley delighted in the Scrap Sales ManagerÆs name of Cheetham)

In October 1964 Labour returned to power. The new Minister of Transport, Tom Fraser, decided that details of all future closure proposals should be submitted to him before issuing public notices. Much to ShirleyÆs disgust, he also required to see what was involved in lifting and disposing of track and assets that had already been closed, before BR could enter into any firm commitments.


Quotations from "Miscellaneous Railway Characters" http://www.transporttreasury.co.uk/browse.asp?page=347

ôWhy have you got two stations at Lincoln, Hardy? Get one closed at once.ö

The single-needle telegraph, a wonderful medium for all-line communication, was said by Shirley to be years out of date (which it was). He insisted that these instruments must be replaced at once by telephones. In fact they remained until electrification

I successfully weathered a Shirley inquisition, the secret being not to answer every one of his barrage of questions but to batten on by good luck or a trust in God to the right ones which we did.

En route once more, we passed the carefully screened 1874 Midland Pullman doing duty as a messroom (thus avoiding another Shirley outburst)


From Gerard Fiennes "I tried to run a railway" (1967)

When Phillip Shirley rings up on a hot Sunday and says ôGerry, I am sitting in a garden at Retford. A train has just gone up with a pacific engine, a brake van and 14 wagonsö I take notice. The train does not run on the next or any subsequent Sunday.

ôWhy have you got two stations at Lincoln, Hardy? Get one closed at once.ö

Sums it all up quite nicely. Destroy a transport system in the name of cost. Now we have the likes of Stonehouse, where anyone who wants to travel to Bristol has to go via Gloucester or Swindon, despite the fact that a station existed on the Midland main line and provided a direct link. But you can't have two stations, so the customer finds an alternative form of transport. The business doesn't make a saving by cost cutting, it loses it.

I don't know if it is still available but 'The Train that ran away' by Stewart Joy is a good read about the finances of BR in the 60s.

If nothing else, the phrase "solving yesterday's problems with tomorrow's money" has plenty of application to business and government today

madhattie wrote:

ôWhy have you got two stations at Lincoln, Hardy? Get one closed at once.ö

Sums it all up quite nicely. Destroy a transport system in the name of cost. Now we have the likes of Stonehouse, where anyone who wants to travel to Bristol has to go via Gloucester or Swindon, despite the fact that a station existed on the Midland main line and provided a direct link. But you can't have two stations, so the customer finds an alternative form of transport. The business doesn't make a saving by cost cutting, it loses it.

True, but only up to a point.

One new spur in Sheffield allowed traffic to be concentrated at Sheffield Midland. Manchester lost no services directly as a result of closing Exchange and Central stations. Likewise, Leeds central traffic could be accommodated at City station.

On the other hand (or so my parents told me because I was only 15 months old at the time!) they stopped using the train from Staple Hill to Bristol when St. Phillips closed, because TM was inconveniently sited for the central shops. After 1953 they went by bus instead - and he was a railwayman with privilege tickets!

As regards Stonehouse, a good point, but has it not been at least partially addressed be the reopening of Cam and Dursley?

Robin Summerhill wrote: As regards Stonehouse, a good point, but has it not been at least partially addressed be the reopening of Cam and Dursley?

Not unless you both have a car and don't mind the 5 mile journey along backroads to get to it.

I've always wondered why a new station couldn't be build at Stonehouse either north of the level crossing on Oldends Lane or south of the A419. My grandmother lives in the centre of Stonehouse and I'd take the train from Bristol to visit her if I could actually get off it.

For that matter it's a pity that the Midland Railway didn't build its line slightly to the east so that it served the Stanleys and then swung around to join the Swindon line before Stonehouse station rather than after.

Nothing to do with the subject, but i was 2 in 1953 when Staple Hill closed, although i did not stop using it until it closed. I have something in the back of my mind telling me a i know the name Summerhill, and i know Staple Hill very well i was born there, and now ironically i too live in Wiltshire.

horace wrote:Nothing to do with the subject, but i was 2 in 1953 when Staple Hill closed, although i did not stop using it until it closed. I have something in the back of my mind telling me a i know the name Summerhill, and i know Staple Hill very well i was born there, and now ironically i too live in Wiltshire.

There are plenty of Summerhills in the area (or at least there were then!) and, if you were using Staple Hill station until it closed, we almost certainly have met! (1953 was when St Phillips closed and the services re-routed to TM - Staple Hill closed in 1966)

We lived in Gloucester Road. My parents moved us to Stockwood in 1964, but I kept in touch with the regular leading porter, Cyril Batten, until Staple Hill station closed. He ended up as Lampman at Yate and retired in 1967.

WR Tim wrote:
For that matter it's a pity that the Midland Railway didn't build its line slightly to the east so that it served the Stanleys and then swung around to join the Swindon line before Stonehouse station rather than after.

Hindsight is a wonderful thing!

Rather more likelihood of Bristol Road reopening at some time in the future than the Midland line being swung east to serve Burdett Road