Re: Dr Beeching

[news@largeprefer.co.uk ("E.D. Wivens")]

In article <771u23$od4$1@reader1.reader.news.ozemail.net>, "David
Proctor" <daproc@spam_this.umpires.com> writes:

[rearranged]

>Daryl Cheshire wrote in message <7718qd$2bv$1@eplet.mira.net.au>...
>>I have heard of several references to Dr Beeching in regard to rail
>closures
>>in Britain. Who was he and what did he do?
>>
>>So far I have gathered, he held some sort of enquiry into rail services and
>>recommended closures which were followed up (in the '50s?). Was he an
>>external consultant or the head of BR?

>Daryl - I have cross-posted this to uk.railway - they will be able to answer
>you better - I know a good deal of the history, but not all of it, and the
>readers of that newsgroup will have a far closer view of it, as well as
>being able to inject a bit of emotion and politics into the answer.

>Suffiuce to say that Dr. Beeching, although despised at the time for closing
>a lot of railway lines, was probably the saviour of the railways in the
>United Kingdon, in that if those lines had NOT closed, the railways would
>have lost far more money than they did, and the closures eventually would
>have been greater!

A lot of this is from memory so stand by for the corrections.

Dr. Richard Beeching was appointed as Chairman of the newly formed
British Railways Board in June 1961 by the Minister of Transport.

His brief was to basically make the railways pay.

The first task he undertook was a survey of the British railways
network designed to find out which parts were profitable and where the
losses were being made.

His report "The Reshaping of British Railways" was published in 1963
and gave an accurate description of the state of the network for the
first time.

It had been suspected a lot of the rail network was under used and
therefore uneconomic. The report revealed that only half the routes
covered the cost of operating them, and that half the stations
produced about 95% of all the revenue.

When the "Beeching Plan" was finalised in 1965, it recommended that
only about half of the 17,000 miles of track be retained. It also
suggested that 3,000 miles should be considerably upgraded.

Other effects were the end of steam traction (although this had
started to be phased out with the 1955 Modernisation Plan) and the
introduction of container traffic.

True to form the politicians were quick to act on the cost reduction
part of the plan and a lot of rail mileage disappeared in the late
'60s and about 2,000 stations were closed.

As you might imagine the part of the Beeching Plan that involved the
spending of money was not implemented as quickly. Some major schemes,
such as the electrification of the West Coast Main Line, were however
undertaken.

I hope that answers your question, Daryl. Basically Dr. Beeching was
the "Head" of BR and did what he was briefed to do by the British
Government.

He is however usually portrayed as being a "hatchet man" wielding the
axe. 

I feel sorry for him sometimes, but that's probably heresy :)

Wivens
-- 
E.D. Wivens
Largeprefer Limited
<URL:http://www.largeprefer.co.uk/>