HS2 and Cemeteries

[Redroger]

Well, I believe that French Railways (Nationalised SNCF) own Eurostar, though it could be another company own by the French Govenment. On the other issues if you get your electricity from EDF (Electricite de France)  remember you are subsidising prices to the French people.I am a  firm believer in Nationalised Industries provided they are owned by the country they operate in.

[Redroger]

Do we actually own anything these days?     I thought the French were major shareholders in most things British.

I remember  the "Beeching Cuts" to the railways, due to the maintenance being 8 men per mile as opposed to one man per mile to maintain the road network.

Strange thing was that many of the additional men quoted as 7 extra per mile were due to a variety of saety resrictions imposed over the years by the Parliament which set up the Beeching enquiry.
Times have changed, we are 60 years on, and the Beeching report is irrelevant though it got him his peerage.

[Lensmeister]

Beeching was the scapegoat.

It was Ernest Marples behind the axing of the railways.
Ernest Marples ... road builder ... hmm makes you think

[Redroger]

Beeching was the scapegoat.

It was Ernest Marples behind the axing of the railways.
Ernest Marples ... road builder ... hmm makes you think

Could be argued that Marples was the scapegoat since ultimately it was a cabinet decision. It got Beeching a peerage £380 a day now approx, and cost Marples his seat also same price + minister's salary.
Some things haven't altered in 100 years.

[Rena]

In case anyone is wondering:-

"Heathrow Airport Holdings Limited is in turn owned by FGP Topco Limited, a consortium owned and led by the infrastructure specialist Ferrovial S.A. (25.00%), Qatar Investment Authority (20.00%), Caisse de Dépôt et placement du Québec (CDPQ) (12.62%), GIC (11.20%), Australian Retirement Trust (11.18%), China Investment "

[Top-of-the-hill]

  Says it all!

[Nick_Ips]

Beeching was the scapegoat.

It was Ernest Marples behind the axing of the railways.
Ernest Marples ... road builder ... hmm makes you think

Could be argued that Marples was the scapegoat since ultimately it was a cabinet decision. It got Beeching a peerage £380 a day now approx, and cost Marples his seat also same price + minister's salary.
Some things haven't altered in 100 years.

Both Beeching and Marples were scapegoats.  Beeching was appointed to BTC in March 1961.  The length of route miles closed in 1961, 62, 63 and 1964 were 150, 780, 324 and 1058 miles respectively (total = 2312 miles)

Wilson's government promised to halt the closures when they came to power in October 1964.  The route miles closed in 1965, 66, 67 and 1968 were 600, 750, 300 and 400 respectively (total = 2050 miles).  Barbara Castle wasn't a road builder in the way Marples was, but Wilson's government were almost as good at closing railways.

For completeness, Marples took office as Transport Minister in 1959. Between 1950 and 1958 there were 1650 route miles closed: Marples wasn't the first Transport Minister to oversee extensive closures.

The truth is somewhere around the fact the UK had a post-war clapped-out* railway network which was far more extensive than needed.  The network had developed as a result of capitalist speculation, rather than a proper plan.  (*overused and under maintained through the war years)

Someone needed to cut the network down to size and orientate it towards what was needed.  Beeching and Marples were the lucky ones who got the job and forevermore will have the role of panto villian.

On the positive side, the closures meant we gained an extensive system of heritage railways so people today can enjoy historic trains in the way they were designed to be used.  And Beeching's support for freight containerisation (something he is rarely credited for) has led to us having a rail network where freight container movements have grown to the level where we need to look at projects like HS2 to create additional capacity.

[Rena]

At the bottom of our street was an extremely busy LNER branch line .  A  group of us local children stood with our notebooks and pencils collecting engine numbers as the trains whistled passed us, whether they were long goods trains from the dockyards or passenger trains from the town centre.

When I researched my maternal great grandfather,  I found that there was a railway line in the factory yard where he worked and, in fact, many other companies such as timber companies had lines that led directly onto the docks.

Looking at an old image of the LNER railway lines in relation with other lines,  it can be seen that they more or less mimic the cog wheels of an old pocket watch with each cog/line interacting with other cogs/lines.   When Beeching cut off the "feeder" lines many main railway lines ran at a loss.