Ian Hislop goes off the rails

[Sciroccology]

Very interesting. The history of rail travel and Dr Beeching's revolutionary changes.


ETA: BBC4 now

Edited by Sciroccology on Sunday 5th October 20:11

[Dogwatch]

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'Twas on B4 on Thursday. Yes, good programme. Eerie parallels with today's Post Office closures but couldn't blame the EU then.

[Parabola]

Is it a one off or part of a series?

[BruceV8]

V interesting proramme. It was the first time I hade seen footage of Dr Beeching and funnily enough he looked and sounded exactly as I imagined him. Ernest Marples was a bit of a card, wasn't he?

[mrmaggit]

Being a railway fan, I always held him in complete contempt for closing most of the system, I mean as an analogy I used to use, how would we get around if all we had were motorways?

Then I read the entire Report, and changed my mind. I now think he was correct, and it was a shame that the "spending" part of the report wasn't implemented, just the "closing" bits.

And who do you think implemented most of the report?

As a by product, however, the Act effectively saved the steam locomotive and opened the door for all sorts of preservation societies to flourish, not just railway ones. It jolted people into realising what history was being lost, and to act to preserve before it was lost forever.

[andy400]

Beeching was a bit of a tt IMO.

Closures are one thing, but I still can't believe they didn't hang on to the real estate to enable future re-opening of lines should it prove necessary. So much was sold off, and now there are many places where the railway line could easily be useful and profitable, but all the land is now covered by shopping centres, industrial estates and peoples gardens. Incredibly short-sighted. Frankly [b]I[/b} could have done better, and I'm thicker than a whale omelette.