British Railways (BR), which later traded as British Rail, ran most of the British railway system from the nationalisation of the Big Four British railway companies in 1948 until the privatisation of its railway services in stages between 1994 and 1997.
This period saw massive changes in the railway network: steam traction was eliminated in favour of diesel and electric power, passengers replaced freight as the main source of business, and the network was severely rationalised.
The rail transport system in Great Britain developed during the 19th century. After the grouping of 1923 under the Railways Act 1921 there were four large railway companies, each dominating its own geographic area:
- Great Western Railway (GWR)
- London, Midland and Scottish Railway (LMS)
- London and North Eastern Railway (LNER)
- Southern Railway (SR)
Railway profitability suffered during the great depression of the 1930s, capital spending was postponed and maintenance cut back. This meant that state of Britain's railways was already poor on the eve of Second World War. During the war, the railways were taken into state control as a vital part of the wartime economy. They were heavily damaged by enemy action, and a further lack of capital investment and maintenance caused by wartime economic necessity compounded this. In parallel with the rest of Britain's economy, after the war the railways were in a very run-down state.
A small number of independent light railways and industrial railways, which did not contribute significant mileage to the system, were not included in British Railways; nor were the London Underground and the Glasgow Underground, which were already public concerns, the Liverpool Overhead Railway, and non-railway-owned tramways. The Northern Counties Committee lines owned by the LMS were quickly sold to the Northern Ireland government, becoming part of the Ulster Transport Authority (UTA) in 1949.
The new system was split geographically into six regions along the lines of the Big Four:
- Eastern Region (ER) — southern LNER lines.
- North Eastern Region (NER) — northern LNER lines in England and all ex-LMS lines east of Skipton.
- London Midland Region (LMR) — LMS lines in England and Wales and most ex-LNER lines west of Skipton.
- Scottish Region (ScR) — LMS and LNER lines in Scotland.
- Southern Region (SR) — SR lines.
- Western Region (WR) — GWR lines.
These regions formed the basis of the BR business structure until the 1980s. The regional boundaries were re-drawn on several occasions in the 1950s to make them more geographically-based rather than being based on pre-nationalisation ownership. The North Eastern Region was merged with Eastern Region in the 1960s; a new Anglia Region was split off from the Eastern Region in the 1980s. They retained a level of independence, though there was also some centralisation.
Sources of Information
[1] Wikipedia