Down the Line - A look into the legacy of the cuts made to the rail network by Doctor Beeching
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 28 ก.ค. 2013
- Joe Crowley meets the people who battled to save their local railway lines in the South of England in the 1960's.
First aired on BBC One 26th October 2008
Whenever Beeching is discussed we hear the phrase "bought in to make the Railways profitable". The fact is the railways were a public service, not a profit making enterprise. This was the folly in the whole Beeching program in my opinion but when you look at the then Transport Ministers links with big road building projects it all becomes clear. We lost our branch line and a few years later the M5 ploughed straight across the track bed destroying any possibility that it could be put back into service. The whole thing stunk and it saddens me to read what we as a nation lost.
I totally agree with you. Plus, say the line is a standard double gauge, running 12 30-seater trains. The last time I checked two rail tracks next to each other is WAY smaller than the M5.
cbcdesign001says:
"The fact is the railways were a public service, not a profit making enterprise. .."
==
True,
Top priority is to promote better economic growth.
It's a good example of corporate profit interest taking over the public interest.
It's fair to say some lines should have closed, some only temporarily to allow the infrastructure to be rebuilt, upgrading the technology and improving the service, other countries after the war had railways in a much worst of a state than our own, and look at them now.
Our country is a great inventer of ideas, but we're rubbish at fully utilising those ideas thanks to the British business strategies, (it's making money, let's sell it on. It's not making money, cut funding, oh no it's making less money, sell it on)
Also don't forget that other criminal Ernest Marples, oh and why were talking about these two, and their obvious connection to roads, how many roads get closed down that are not busy all of the time?
Actually the railways were built for profit by private companies. It's what differentiates the UK from other European countries, where they were mainly state built. The railway only became nationalised in 1948.
They should have left all the track beds unbuilt on so that the lines could be brought back if there was a call for them.
Except bastard Beeching wanted to get rid of them because he didn't want railways anymore, he thought motorways for the future. Now look at the M25, and the M1 every rush hour, an absolute chock-o-block traffic.
the government at the time believed that road haulage and private car ownership would make the railways obsolete. Now we have a country full of traffic jams and clogged up motorways. Hell I think if you took all the freight off the roads and back on the railways then those traffic jams would be cut in half. Mind you Beeching didn't get it his own way as many branchlines earmarked for closure are still running lines and many closed lines have become heritage lines keeping steam alive for future generations
I often ask why they didn't do that here in Ireland, where we lost most of our railways at around the same time as Beeching, the explanation people give me is that the railway company still owned the land where the tracks were, but local farmers and country residents saw an opportunity to claim this unused land for themselves, so they began expanding their fields or building houses on the old trackbed, and CIE - the national transport board that owned the land - made no effort to protect the old railway alignments.
Greedy eyes saw that money could be made from ripping up the lines and selling for scrap, all that hard work done by navvies destroyed.
And just was going to pay for them when they were no longer earning even a portion of their costs?
It was not primarily a question of profit. It was a question of the unsustainable level of subsidy the railway infrastructure and running required from a post-war economy that could not sustain it. Investment in facilitating the development of private motor traffic, which is largely paid for directly by individuals and motor tax, is much more efficient, and sustainable. That much of the decision was reasonable. What was short-sighted and unreasonable was destruction of the civil engineering infrastructure and redevelopment of track-beds and other real estate which precluded any later transport re-use of these hard-won national arteries.
Charming Video, Charming Presenter, and Charming work by all the production team.
Its interesting to note that they put the blame on Beeching which is unfair as it was the government who had to sanction the closures. Beeching wrote 2 reports "Reshaping British Railways 1963" and "Major trunk route development 1965"
We also have to look at the political situation as well the first report was done under the Tories but had not been fully acted upon when the Labour party got into power in Oct 1964. It was the Labour party who decided to implement the report in full under the new transport minister Babara Castle. So the people who should be blamed are Harold Wilson,the then Prime Minister, and Babara Castle.
They also ignore the general economic situation fir both BR and the country. From 1964 the financial markets became aware of just how bad Britain's economic performance was. Instead of a balance of payments deficit of around £400 Million it was around £800 Million. This lead to runs on the Pound over the next 3 years until the Pound was devalued by 14% and cost us all of our foreign currency reserves and most of the bullion reserves (spend in a forlorn attempt to protect the Pound).
spot on . labour closed hundreds of miles on top and closed more pits in the 60's then scargill did in the 90's
Interesting story. I tried to make an analogy to the highway system. It would be like tearing up all the roads except for the interstate highways. Devastating would be an understatement. Politicans destroying all those jobs, industries, and communities then probably campaigning with promises that they would bring jobs. No offense intended, but England and Wales seem small enough that a train system would make sense.
Exactly! Flights aren't too economical as they can never travel domestically more than about 300 miles (such as London to Edinburgh, Scotland), so the railways were the perfect answer. Now look at our transport system - you HAVE to have a car to get about your day - train ticket prices are off the scale and our main roads are non-stop traffic jams.
The preserved railways are a superb asset we now have much loved by and old alike
It seemed a good documentary until the cop-out at the end when Dr Beeching's cuts were considered worthwhile.
Shahed MC says:
"It seemed a good documentary until the cop-out at the end when Dr Beeching's cuts were considered worthwhile."
==
It seems to be the trend in so called "Journalism"
You have to mention both sides to look un-biased and fair even when the opposite view is extreme minority.
Yes, it was disturbing at the end when Crowley disclosed his true agenda.
@@allgoo1964 journalism is not supposed to tell you what to think but to give you the information so that you can make a decision or firm your opinions.
@@allgoo1990 the late Paul Foot.
@@allgoo1990 you only asked for a journalist, you never stated they had to be alive.
Now the Britain buys their train from foreign country where they used to show how to build and run the system.
Humiliation.
all engineered that way. out the eu now . let's re tool
@MusicalElitist1 Dude. Get over yourself.
@@funguyfarage3615 Ok, but only if the UK railway industry builds to export, and for this it needs low labour costs! More tricky problems eh?
That was tripe, roads/streets are not expected to make money. Rail lines were stolen from the public.
Rail should be not for profit.
After being stolen from the private companies that had owned them.
@@adelarsen9776 railways were built to make a profit.
@@neiloflongbeck5705 No shit Sherlock.
it was not beeching. the report was commissioned by the tories ( NHS was the tories too) British rail could not even tell you how many people it employed either, The labour party got in and did not close all of beechings proposals but shut many miles on top of what he reported !! So thank you labour the biggest pit shutter too in the 60's
The irony is that the loss making branch lines were what made the main lines money once they were cut those lines fell into deficit too, terrible economics done by a bunch of heartless bean counters with no long term strategy. If they at least left the right of ways the routes could be implemented again as population sprawl calls for it, after all his massive cuts only saved 25 million pounds over 10 years
beaching was a vandle he decimated our railways. mouth many lines saved for preservation we thank those wise men and women well done ..
labour,check our facts
Ernest Marples was the real villain. Beeching made his cuts with the option to eventually reopen the branch lines. Marples tore up the tracks and built roads instead
McMillan should have taken more of the blame for this destruction. "You never had it so good, but I'll put a stop to that"
McMillan was also lying when he said that. The economic policies his government and the other Conservative governments between 1951 and 1964 caused the destruction of the economy from 1964 onwards.
interesting vid -- cheers 4 sharing
I rode the train from Cowes to Newport with my gran.....
The railway has gone, and the bus service is useless, to get round the Island on public transport is a nightmare.....
Strange for such a small place.
Whilst I will agree a rational approach had to be taken to transport, the legacy of the 60s lives on, which brought no tangible
Improvement in transport, just a series of spives and carpetbaggers with get rich quick schemes under written by pals in government, who knew the price of everything and the value of nothing.
This, coupled with a lack of intellect, reason or vision (very common in England) is why in 2020 public transport is as it is, and the railways are underfunded in private hands...
heard in a doc beeching / marples cuts saved around 25 million in old money which will cost billions to put back even part of the lines they took away
beeching cut nothing
Beeching said what needed to be said insofar as it couldn't go on as it was. What happened thereafter was one of the most short sighted ill conceived disasters imaginable. However it had started a decade before. There had been a scary number of closures then. It's scary because it's large and scary because it's overlooked and scary because Beeching is solely blamed in the collective imagination. It doesn't make him any different and doesn't let him off. He could have gone to a few parties, done different drugs, taken up the guitar and come up with an entirely different report ( though the references to purple spiders may have been redacted). But here he was, the sum product of the times with his report and that was that.
what Beeching did was a big fat mistake!
I'm glad Preservationists are restoring trains & track
labour party not beeching
@@funguyfarage3615 and then due to economic situation they inherited they couldn't afford to not go through with the cuts.
If it was not for Dr Beeching... We would have so many steam railways that we have now!
A steam loc has a thermal efficiency of 6-12%. A coal power plant about 40%. I get it.
But why on Earth bother with diesels? In the early 50's we had excellent Westinghouse E-locs in the Netherlands, and modern passenger coaches that lasted over half a century. Why not go straight from steam to electric?
It is shortsighted to not go straight to electric traction from steam as you say but the reason they went for Diesel was the immediate large cost saving in not having to install all of the Overhead Line Equipment.
For example in the UK BR was so under pressure to save money all of the time they even only electrified the South Western Line (from London Waterloo to Weymouth) up to Bournemouth in 1967 thinking it worthwhile on cost grounds to use Diesel locomotives (Class 33) to propel trains for the remaining journey to Weymouth. Only in 1988 was the line electrified all the way to Weymouth (and this was 3rd rail electrification, cheaper to install than for OLE). Crazy I know.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/South_Western_main_line
Of course the Diesel engine is very efficient (at least 40% and up to 50% for low speed engines used on large ships); I was under the impression that you're lucky if you get 7% from a single acting steam locomotive, exacerbated by the coal fire being difficult to control. Of course the efficiency further plummets should the safety relief valve lift !!
Obviously because some dear old boy got a bung. Same with doing away with trams which were highly efficient and eco friendly. Diesel was going to be cheaper.
I didn't know Tom Scott did merch'
...coz that's a shirt we all want!
Biggest mistake that was made wasn't closing the lines, it was selling off the land. A huge swathe of the lines lost are now needed but the land in now built on. Beeching was a fix it now and never mind the future sort of guy, very short sighted attitude when dealing with public services. It should of all been mothballed.
Beeching report 1963. Labour government took over in 1964, so who was really to blame?
If he were alive today, he could have been tried fro treason! The closures of many of the loss making lines Could have been may have COST those areas over the time since. One obvous example is the Bishop's Stortford to Dunmow/ Braintree line, which ran just south of Stansted Airport (now London Stansted) when the airport expanded and had to be connected to the rail network, an expensive tunnel under tjhe working runway needed to be built instead of a short, cheap spur that would have rejouvernated the full line and made easier access from another direction and been a cash cow!
Beeching didn't seem to understand that railways, nationalised into one, wasn't there to make money, it was there to provide a public service. You don't build the a motorway so you can make money off of it, you do it for the benefit of the population.
if that's the case then no pits / steel works etc etc should have closed either. anyway it was labour that closed the lines not beeching
Apart from the lines, we lost the engineering excellence that we gave to the world! The railways needed funding after WW2 as they were in a terrible state. Even Germany didn't drop their steam locos overnight. They ran them well into the 1970s. With the slash of a pen, Beeching sent brand now locos off for scrap and these locos were not allowed on the mainline. With these engines went the drivers, firemen and a host of workers who maintained them!
? locos had to go, diesel and electric was the way forward , as it is now still and remember beeching closed no lines, it was labour that closed them
@Aussie Pom marples? the real closeures came after the report was done. Labour was in power then and it was labour that closed the lines. Labour did not close all his recomendations but closed 100's of miles on top!!!! .After the deed was done labour then gave beeching an award. it too the next tory government in 1970 to stop the madness
cut , cut and keep cutting has always been the tory mantra from the past ,present and future.
Just like what happened here in the states in the late 1970s all through the 80s...
Some closures were necessary, in some cases lines had one train running up and down carrying one person or nobody at all, in cases like that the line had to go, but a lot of lines closed that should never have done. it wasn't all Beeching's fault though, it was the transport minister of the day that had the final say.
Beeching. The most hated Englishman of all time
You can't put Beckham in the same category as Beeching
why? he didn't shut the lines, he had no power to. you will find it was labour
Maybe notorious; but hated? Come off it! He was employed, on a somewhat myopic brief, by the government of the day to reduce the enormous cost of the railway to the taxpayer. Beeching, using his brilliant scientific brain, trained to micro analyse, did exactly that!. And as Andrew Dawson says, Labour followed Tory and went on closing lines on Beeching's list, including the Oxford-Cambridge route which he'd never ever recommended for closure, but for development. The transport issues of the early sixties were in any case very different to today. So comparisons are too often way off beam historically.
@@cfb15jan Beeching was a genius. He saved billions each year for the taxpayers. He closed duplicate lines and hopeless rural branches with 5 passengers a day. A few mistakes were made. Some cross country routes like the Varsity line would prove useful today. But overall he did a 90% good job.
Joe, you are a beautiful boy!
do not put the blame on Beaching put the Blame on Earnest Maples he all ready asset striped the railways for the roads
I agree Marples and that tos$er Richard Marsh. Crooks
you'll find labour closed the lines.tories commissioned a report. labour closed his recommendations,not all ,but closed lots of lines on top!! labour not beeching
@@funguyfarage3615 Beeching was the facilitator though and he did a great job closing many duplicate lines and uneconomic rural branches. He has saved the country countless billions over the years.
Someone lend me a Tardis and a sniper rifle.........job done....Britain back on track!👍🏻🇬🇧
Subbed :-)
As I understand it benching never closed the hayling island branch it made a profit it was the cost of repairing the bridge is why it was closed
Everybody blames Dr Beeching but it wasn't his fault. He was following the orders of his senior, Ernest Marples who owned a contractor business which, among other things, built roads. Maples ordered the report to be made and then got Dr Beeching to implement the closure of non-profit making lines. No attempt was made to look into ways of making the lines pay. To build more roads to compensate for the loss of the railways was a nice little money earner!
Marples used to own a Civil Engineering Co, and was a Director of it until he resigned as a director of Marples Ridgeway in 1951 when he was made a junior cabinet minister. He was required to do so by Parliamentary law, as ministers and above are required to do so today. So he had no involvement with the running of his old firm and could prove it for 9 years before he was made Minister of Transport in 1960. He certainly did not close lines to build roads, the root cause of the problem was the wording in the 1962 Transport Act that specified lines had to operate at a profit. If not they should close. Marples always had to operate within the letter of the law of the 1962 Act; indeed lines were only subsidized as of a social need when Castle was Minister in the mid 1960,s and the 1968 Transport Act when it became statute provided a means of subsidies for loss making lines that were of a social need.
In fact Beeching was bound by contract not to consider cost saving ideas. A clause that led him to row furiously with Sir Ivan Stedeford, since I bet he wasn't allowed to mention it...
Lets not forget Beeching had a big input into building our motorways. The ultimate goal was to destroy unions.
In the US we lost a lot of rural branch lines as well. If the only major freight business on the line closed, the branch line closed. The private railroads did so in the US none were owned and operated by the government. Simply put, by the 1960s, steam was replaced by diesels, and interstate highways/motorways networks were being built for the cars and trucks. Bypasses were built on the edge of towns and cities which the interstates/motorways skirted, and the new commercial industries built there were not well served by railway lines. The government owes no one a well paid job, and shouldn't be in the railway business in the first place.
As in the US private bus lines took the rail passenger and light freight business, and now courier freight lines have replaced the buses. Packages are delivered to your home, not to a post office or rail depot. Transportation changed and the rail lines had to change as well, whether private or government operated.
SeaToby11 Good points - but also not to be forgotten in the US, was the demise of the streetcar and interurban lines. In New York, we had LaGuardia, who stopped the purchase of 500 PCC cars for Manhattan's street railways. The Els were torn down in promise of new subways which still have not been built. And don't forget the most anti-rail politico in NYC - Robert Moses, who literally wanted expressways everywhere and transit nowhere. Good thing not all of them were built.....
***** The UK is most likely like the eastern seaborne of the US, with towns joining other towns a few miles apart. But there are areas in the US midwest where you can drive twenty miles or more between towns, many without railroad lines today. BNSF is closing Amtrak's Southwest Chief line over the Raton Pass through southern Colorado and northern New Mexico, leaving Amtrak to switch its route through Amarillo, more than a hundred miles south. Amtrak is attempting to keep the line open with the states of Colorado and New Mexico picking up the maintenance tab. Neither state wishes to do so. BNSF is doing so because there aren't any freight customers left on that line. The sad fate of railway lines in the US when there are no freight customers left on a line of track. Yet, the British complain when they close a branch line to nowhere several miles away from another line. We are in the 21st century, we no longer live in the world of no paved roads of the 19th century.
I think the Government cuts to the Railways back in the 60's was step too far, So many small towns and villages cut off from the rest of world, if they wanted to makes cuts, they should of close stations that were seeing low traffic and leave the tracks alone. Thanks God the Government left the ECML alone, Just imagine if that line closed between Newcastle and London Kings Cross, this would of made a massive impact of my life as i can't drive as my disabillity stop me from being able to drive.
The Hayling Branch closed in 1963, was not a Beeching cut !! The Beeching cuts were not implemented until 1966
It was a Beeching cut. 1962-1964 was the Beeching era. The legislation used to speed closure was the Transport Act 1962
@@DJ_K666 Rubbish! The Beeching report was published in 1963!! Then there was a two to three years consultation period to allow people to object against their local line or station closing!! therefore if the Hayling island branch closed in 1963 the closure proposal must have been two or three years before ,like 1961 or 1960 !! So therefore nothing to do with Beeching!!!!!!!!!
@@Sam_Green____4114 I've just re-read it and yes you're right. March 1963. I got it confused with the 62 Transport Act year-wise
@@DJ_K666 The Beeching Report issued in 1963 makes mention of Other Lines Scheduled for closure, of which the Hayling Island Branch Line was one and locally here in Mid Sussex was the Haywards Heat to Ardingly to Horsted Keynes line which was electrified 3rd rail DC. As such these were Branchline Committee closures.
Dr Beeching didn’t close any Railways. It was the Labour government between 1964 and 1970 that shut them . People need to wise up to the facts.
what a waste. we need more commuter rail. the highway congestion in the Washington d.c. area is way out of hand
The railways had to cut down they would have needed the total GDP of UK
All companies that are nationalised end up with massive subsidies
IE mines british transport
At the time we were just recovering from the war and still paying our war dept
It was in the 1990s when we finaly paid it off
The opening comments are almost entirely irrelevant. Bee hints brief was to substantially reduce BR's horrendous losses by rationalising the system. He had no brief to consider social disruption. If you want someone to blame for the results I suggest
A. The govt brief.
B. The incompetent BR board members going back to nationalisation day.
The one person you cannot blame was Beeching. BR still made massive losses after he had cut it to the bone.
C. The great British public, who were deserting the railways in droves to embrace the motor car. Not to mention fare dodging, which was rife to the point of being an epidemic.
D. The rail employees themselves, who were often robbing their employers blind.
Needed subtitles for David Sheperd. Sometimes he sounded like Rowley Birkin QC from The Fast Show!
Railways? You need to build more Hiltons to put more angroes there. HAHAHAHA
It's sad to realize that while the Marshall Plan was helping Germany build one of the most thorough and efficient, post-war rail systems in the world, Britain was keen to take a much more dismal and embarrassing route towards dismantlement; which leads me to believe there were not too many economically, or financially clever people in government at the time. Certainly, Dr. Beeching wasn't much of a visionary. For someone who was considered brilliant and intellectual, he took the simplest, most unimaginative, and most destructive approach to a very real problem; which was basically the result of poor management in the first place. He took a bad situation, and made it significantly worse by suggesting the easiest way out; and the government, and people like Marsh and Marples, followed suit; and usually the residual money trail as well........... it was a one failure, remedied by another even more comprehensive failure.
The thing is if the railways were never nationalised and kept as the so-called 'Big four' railway companies (the LNER, GWR, SR and LMS), they wouldn''t be collectively making huge losses. So even if the Wymondham to Wells line on the LNER was extremely profitable, it would still be dragged down by the huge losses on the Newquay - Penzance line on the GWR. And for the "not too many economically, or financially clever in the government at the time", Clement Attlee led the most left-wing government Britain has ever had.
@@Ibirdball It ws the Macmillan government that began it Macmillan said the railways were to operate like a business. Marples brought in Beeching to come up with the report and gave him a brief of 'If it doesn't make money, close it' and did not allow him to consider money saving options such as singling the track or cutting costs. This actually led to fierce clashes between him and Sir Ivan Stedeford on the committee which produced the final report. Beeching was not really the villain, Marples was as he was joint owner of Marples Ridgeway who were a road construction firm. Also when BR was created they were required to pay compensation to the former shareholders of the Big Four railway compaines so that crippled them too. Then they were not permitted to compete price wise with road haulage. It was just one big screw up after another. Then the Wilson government took over on a pledge to stop the cuts, only to discover on taking power that it was unaffordable, although in that period (1964-1969) the Labour Government closed some f the more vital lines such as the Great Central and the Waverley line. All a big mess.
Richard Beeching, the world's biggest trainsphobe.
HAD TO HAPPEN WAS COSTING US, THE TAXPAYER MILLIONS BEECHING JUST MADE IT PROFFITABLE or tried to. ! FOLK LIKE ME WANTED OUR OWN TRANSPORT SCOOTERS CARS !
Nice programme but that's all. It seems like Dr. Beeching's estate made this all possible.
I really love how efficient the railway service has become since your favourite politician decided that privatisation was the way to do it. Many millions of passengers can now be thankful that tariffs are so complicated that they no longer have a choice of 2 or 3 fares but many hundreds. It gladdens my heart to think that a few wealthy individuals at the top of corporations benefit from this. At one time any Tom, Dick or Harry could benefit from subsidisation due to shared ownership of the transport system, now thankfully, it benefits financially those who deserve it most, the ones who pay the least tax. I really like your Bentley too. You obviously deserve it for your hard work which is much more taxing than digging ditches or sweeping streets. It is wonderful that we live in a world where moving numbers around in a computer is rewarded more than actually producing something that can actually be used for doing things. I applaud the values and ethics that you evidently live by and wish that everyone could also share these. Unfortunately they can't, because you and other smears of slime like you have climbed up and pulled the ladder up after you. Great to know you have your money in Nassau - biggest tax haven in the world. I would love to meet you one day Adrian and kick your fucking teeth down your privileged self satisfied throat - preferably just before you were planning a guzzle of dom perignon paid for by the rest of us.
You'd make a good Nazi
ROFL - pot calling the kettle?
The agenda of this program it seems was to justify beeching and the cuts it seems, BBC are biased as hell, beeching spent money to tear up track, cancelling services and closing station is all that would have been needed, the railways never became profitable after the cuts, his actions didn't work, they should have raised ticket prices, but again by this point onward government couldn't run anything well or efficiently privatisation didn't help either. UK rail Prices are some of the most expensive in Europe.
If the BBC said it was dark outside, I'd have to go out and have a look.....
Beeching didn't close any Railways he only did the report, Ernest Marples WAS THE CROOK HE HAD TO LEAVE THE COUNTRY .
Anyone who profited from this industrial vandalism should be asset stripped
Beeching was a Tory working for Torys ... that says enough.
+Phil Homes Evil Troy vandals. They'd bulldoze York Minster if there was profit to be made.
Do not call him doctor he is not!!!
JML
Books have to be balanced …
And Dr B did. exactly what he was asked to do, and did it well.
He is the reason I would never vote Conservative Beeching and Enoch Powell.
What idiot decided to use that totally wrong whistle on most of the Train vids, such a shame as this is a very well researched and made film otherwise.
Joe Crowley is a total prat, I'm not well enough to ride a cycle , but fit enough to ride a train.
See the problem?