Vintage railway film - Second report on modernisation - 1961

This vintage railway film, produced by British Transport Films in 1961, is the second instalment in the series setting out the British Railways modernisation scheme.

[@geoffbarry9540]

Sixty years ago...I was 14. I'm still here and remember so much of what this film represented. And then it was gone, so quickly and, like so many others, I was blind to its happening. I don't mourn for its passing; that truly was, for the most part, inevitable. I mourn for my lack of awareness, realisation and participation in the events of the time. "If only" is a pointless catchphrase, but I cannot but regret that I never travelled on the Brighton Belle or even in a Southern Region :Pullman car; never journeyed to Westerham; never clattered the now Tramlink line to Wimbledon..and so on...time and place make fools of us all. Oh, and of course that elegaic swansong of the steam locomotive express on the LSWR main line in 1967...too busy drinking and playing football I'm afraid.....and I, of course, am only thinking of my Southern region

[@whitesands928]

Geoff, I was 15 and like you I too missed the end of steam, beer, girls and cars was my reason for missing the demise of steam. sometimes I have regrets but I think I would of been sad at the state of steam in its final years. I wouldn’t change it, i had a lot of fun in the 60’s, I was changing like the railways.

[@elrjames7799]

@@whitesands928 Beer and girls have nothing to do with setbacks to the railway.

[@elrjames7799]

Not really Geoff. You're trying to retroactively apply a nostalgia to something which didn't have it in 1961. The ruthless pursuit of road transport above all others (including air and rail) and at the taxpayers expense was something that none of us ordinary people were capable of defying, even at the ballot box.

[@whitesands928]

@@elrjames7799 true.

[@thegreyfolk]

I'll second that thought, Geoff. I was 11 at the time and thought it would be there forever.

[@beatsinabar]

'The railways of Britain can never be complete' - A couple of years before Beeching made sure they never would be!

[@gwpee1727]

That's because he was partially correct.A lot of whats on this film,did'nt last long,was badly thought through and did'nt consider the road improvements.

[@thomasm1964]

Which makes a nonsense of the claim that passengers are being inconvenienced today for a better tomorrow!

[@DominicAmann]

@@gwpee1727 You are right in what you say. However, identifying the problem does not guarantee the right solution. Partially identifying the problem makes it even less likely. And starting with a constraint that would effectively prevent the correct solution makes the best solution impossible. Beeching's cuts did not deliver the cost savings he predicted. They did not even give significant cost savings compared to the years before the cuts. The rails still operated at significant deficits after the cuts, so the solution was more cuts. As you hinted at, a large part of the problem was misidentifying the future needs. Those fancy marshalling yards were in fact a huge mistake. The kind of goods that those yards excelled in sorting were dying out and moving to lorries in droves. The yards couldn't staunch that flow. Traffic moved to containers and bulk. Then the Beeching cuts literally cut millions of people off from the rail network. He incorrectly assumed that people would drive miles to their nearest station to take a train. No. Once people get into a car, they drive to their destination. So main line passenger revenues also suffered. Meanwhile whole communities shrank and became impoverished. The government was busy in this period deliberately building the competition to the rails - the motorway network. At huge cost, and even larger land loss and environmental footprint, but no-one complains about that. The same government saw the railways as non-essential and was fundamentally unwilling to subsidize them while people _very_ closely connected to that same government were making _huge_ sums of money building motorways.

[@stevetaylor8698]

@@DominicAmann Yes a good assessment. One thing Beeching did understand was that it wasn't trains themselves that are expensive but the infrastructure costs - stations, track, signals etc. Even now, Network Rail struggles. I wonder if the new Great British Railways will do any better.

[@little_britain]

@@stevetaylor8698 I believe most of the problem is that a certain class of people regard any shared form of transport (public transport) as literally lower class and beneath them, and for purely selfish reasons, are entirely happy to support and build out new selfish, wasteful, environmentally unsupportable motorways and road systems while refusing to subsidize shared rail transport on infrastructure and land already built.

[@paulrobins2397]

Well I enjoyed that! I was 11 when it was made, still trainspotting, but not realising what was going to disappear!

[@waleedarif6740]

This was in my parents era but I can tell, the 1960s and the 70s were the closest decades to being in heaven. They were probably the happiest decades not just for the UK but for the whole world.

[@flippop101]

An incredible film full of optimism.

[@mikeanscombe9883]

I love the footage of freight gliding around the station behind an unmanned Ferguson stereogram...

[@elboobio5920]

"Freight is the lifeblood of the railway", if only someone of any significance would take heed to that one line today. Freight is the black sheep of the railway, it could take so much traffic off of our roads and reduce emissions, but investment never comes and freight is just looked on as an inconvenience to passenger trains.

[@paulnicholson1906]

The problem in Britain is that the distance isn’t far enough. In the USA rail freight is still significant but only for journeys over 500 miles and/bor bulk commodities. It costs the same to move a rail car across town as from New York to Chicago.

[@rogerking7258]

Impressed with the robotug for its time. And the Blue Pullman must surely be the best looking train of all time.

[@neiloflongbeck5705]

Shame it rode like it had no suspension.

[@neiloflongbeck5705]

Zetland House is now just a memory.

[@davidbelcher7180]

The Birds Eye containers were very intricately liveried compared to most 1950s/60s goods stock - Mainline did a good model of these in 00!

[@BibtheBoulder]

What a fabulous video, thanks for posting. Love the fact in spite of BR Modernisation we still (2021) have signal boxes with bells and levers in them on the main lines....

[@edwardshirley9314]

12:32 "rubbing it in and rubbing it off... ...with a massage and a man-sized rinse". I'm sure this plumb-voiced man knew exactly what he was saying, even in 1961 :-)

[@davidmansell5986]

Yeah. "Carry on up the railways!"

[@JamesPetts]

British Railways - using robots in warehouses 60 years before Amazon.

[@TheScotsalan]

Aye... but 100s of ppl pushing the buttons 😳😁👍

[@whitesapphire5865]

Or, as I pointed out to one young upstart just a few days ago "This world was up and running long before you ( he ) had ever soiled your ( his ) first nappy". It's amazing how many young 'uns seem to think the world began on the very day they became self aware.

[@GaryNumeroUno]

The closing comments were very apt... it was the men (and women) that are the most important asset. Shame the lesson was lost on modern management who treat staff like shite.

[@bobsmodelrailways]

Brilliant! Absolutely brilliant. Thank you for sharing!

[@tominnis8353]

Sadly, the large marshalling yards and goods depots were almost obsolete during their construction.

[@neiloflongbeck5705]

Tees Yard was designed for 7,000 wagon movements per day but by the time it opened in May 1963 rail freight tonnage on Teesside had fallen from 9 million tons per year to just under 6 million tons. The yard never handled more than 6,000 wagons per day.

[@markrich7171]

Interesting to see the then brand new Bletchley flyover. Built as part of the East West freight route upgrade to serve the newly planned marshalling yard at Swanbourne but it was never built as Gerry Fiennes refused to send traffic saying correctly that wagon-load traffic was on the decline in favour of bulk trains and containers. The flyover became a white elephant with the odd freight and transfer of class 115 DMU's from Marylebone to Bletchley MPD for servicing plus the odd rail-tour (I traversed it myself on one such tour in 1979) but it's now being rebuilt as part of the new East-West Link which is ironically for passenger rather than freight.

[@Isochest]

I hope this will change

[@djburland]

So positive. Just before the Beeching report ripped it all up, knowing the cost but not the value of the railways!

[@iman2341]

No government since has truly capitalised on the value of the railways.

[@Whizzy-jx3qe]

@@iman2341 How many locomotives are built in the uk today.

[@Steven_Rowe]

If Needing made one mistake it wasn't closing the line so much as selling off the rail corridor. So many lines would have reopened had the corridor been kept. So much optimism . Now everything is built elsewhere including the far Eastern where bats are delicious. Time to say made in the UK again

[@MarKeMu125]

@@Whizzy-jx3qe how many things in general are built in the UK? Not many because when you can buy / manufacture it cheaper from abroad why bother? The entire sector has been allowed to die. Although my housemate from Pakistan says that they loved British things as they know it'll last as a lot of the infrastructure we built over there is still standing. He said that they built a new bridge next to an old one which was British built, new one got completely washed away with the floods, yet the British built one lasted.

[@timothygroves6842]

To combat the flood of manufactured products from low-cost (and low-wage and low worker condition) countries, we could get together with other Western European democracies and form a commercial union, kind of like the US. We could eliminate trading barriers, have common standards, allow the free passage of material and human resources. What an idea. Do you think it could work? The only people who could object would be stuck in the past.

[@RedArrow73]

7:35 - Lovely clip of CO/CP London Underground stock.

[@nigelmitchell351]

Great film thanks for posting. Amazing how times change and money gets wasted, Zetland house along with the huge modern marshalling yards all demolished and gone in no time at all.

[@alanmusicman3385]

A full restored colour-corrected version of this film would be a gem!

[@javwildman]

Gee wiz you dont want much do you, its ten times better quality than most of the "video" shite ones you mostly see on here, either copied to vhs or recorded by it, they are utter garbage.

[@alanmusicman3385]

@@javwildman Absolutely right - a lot of this kind of stuff is only available on YT in poor quality as you describe - and this one is better than most is many respects. However, I was referring to how good this could be made with artificial intelligence processing restoration. Take a look at the example below to see what is now possible - I was really suggesting that whoeever owns this might like to recruit someone to do that. No, not me I don't do that stuff but a lot of people are looking for material to process - or so I'm told. kzbin.info/www/bejne/fIjXiH13oq2omZo

[@kevinskidmore8426]

The comment in the final minute - 'And always behind the shop window is the solid foundation of the whole enterprise.... the men, the men who are moving ahead in step with the advancing speed of the craft they serve'. Must have been made before women were invented ! Sign of the times but still very interesting and enjoyable .

[@fookdatchit4245]

Fantastic viewing TYVM

[@grahamariss2111]

The irony of this film is that at the time of its making the modernisation program had failed, having procured lots of different and almost all plagued with unreliability diesels and invested massively in the fitted wagon traffic at a time when such traffic was in terminal decline. Missed opportunity of the modernisation program was that it failed to predict how the role of railways would change in an age of motor and air transport, instead seeking to create a modernised version of the 19th century railway, that 1950s Britain had inherited thanks to restrictive work practices and two world wars. If only they had been braver in their objectives, then Beaching world have not needed to be so painful.

[@ktipuss]

New South Wales Railways didn't continue with purchasing any diesels after its bad experience with the NSWGR 41 Class en.wikipedia.org/wiki/New_South_Wales_41_class_locomotive From then on it went 100% with North American practice which was much more suitable for Australia's distances and climate. It only returned to British diesel types with the XPT in 1982. The XPTs have not been the success the Govt hoped for, but partly because nothing has been done about the sharp curves and gradients on too many of the lines they use.

[@ktipuss]

Should read "didn't continue with purchasing any more British diesels"

[@MrStarfishPrime]

Same as British Leyland, lots of good ideas delivered with short sighted plans and a massive disconnection between politicians, management and workforce. Just take a look how different German and Japanese companies treat their workers and how they listen to them.

[@bertspeggly4428]

4:57 I lived right next to that laboratory while it was being built. It was completely unguarded, and on weekends my friends and I would explore it. We didn't, but we could have stolen all kinds of stuff. I can't remember exactly when, but a fuel dump caught fire one night and shot flames 100 feet in the air. The lab ended up as a commercial fitness centre.

[@rodneycooperLMSCoach]

There was investment in BR days contrary to what today's commentators may say, but a tremendous amount of transport was achieved on a shoestring in direct contrast to the colossal costs of today's railways.

[@nikerailfanningttm9046]

"the backrooms are invaded by electronics" I was born in 1976 here in the states and I can remember the computers at my first job as a janitor for night shifts at a electronics factory, the computers for the robotic equipment took up half the damn building. Those were the days.

[@VNWas]

Amazing video. Cheers!

[@daystatesniper01]

Lovely upload ,a pity the ro-rail concept was not persued as it could take thousands of lorries of the roads on long journeys

[@ChangesOneTim]

Excellent historical record. Perish the thought that back in the day passengers could traipse among unsecured piles of materials while stations were reconstructed - shocking!😉

[@davidmansell5986]

Fabulous! Not a HV vest or a hard hat in sight. Apparently, in reality, The blue Pullman had a reputation for hard, rough riding.

[@eddherring4972]

I remember those ticket printing plates! I’m a 1973 child.

[@pkscarr]

i got a bit of a laugh out of the description of Crewe station as "full of competence and vigor" having spent many a depressing hour there waiting for delayed or cancelled trains in the last few years

[@unathleticutd]

Really interesting and entertaining watch Thanks 👍😎

[@simonf8902]

Marvellous ideas. The planning room looks like it was inside the Euston arch. Just before it’s demolition. Punch card systems. A massive machine to print tickets. Robo tug moving tiny brown paper parcels. Diesel oil analysed to see if it can be used to make railway coffee. The boat trains at Folkestone run night and day too. Little brown trucks with names at the head.

[@Ass_Burgers_Syndrome]

Yeah I remember when British Rail coffee was only 10p a slice.

[@mandm1642]

This honestly could be the answer to the issues we have now

[@bigdmac33]

Blue Pullman. Fantastic!

[@gazbrucia1654]

Amazing footage. The livery of the Class 31 @ 8.00. Never seen that before. I model the era it would be a spectacular addition!!

[@johnd8892]

Lima.made a model in this livery as well as just about every livery carried by a diesel they made in the nineties. Generated lots of Lima livery collectors.

[@lmn28021992]

Golden Orchid livery. I have the Lima model. It's very well finished.

[@joncrawford3485]

Sadly D5579 was culled in the great class 31 scrappage of the 1980's, however D5830 has been liveried out in that particular puke-colour... See here: www.gcrailway.co.uk/the-railway/locomotives/d5830/

[@mandymoo7406]

amazing it finished with the blue pullman as this passed my house in yorkshire in aug this year and i had never seen it before

[@srfurley]

None of the Blue Pullman vehicles survived into preservation. The train that is running around today is a ‘70s HST painted to look something like one, but there are important differences, the most important one probablyeing that the Blue Pullman Power cars had passenger accommodation in them but the HST ones do not.

[@marcusdoling7698]

Wonderful. Wonderful!!

[@robharding4028]

Its mind boggling when you stop and think of all that maintenance and up grading of the system actually entails, No wonder the tickets prices have to increase on such a regular basis.

[@JeffreyOrnstein]

Very good, thanks.

[@tangerinedream7211]

What optimistic plans and ideology,a film today would spin the advantages and necessity and phenomenal value for money if HS2.

[@barriewhiteley1692]

What a shame all the lines closed by beeching how useful they would be now

[@stevenbrrtt]

Just skim over the first few lines in this film, particularly the sentences dealing with the modernization of the stations. How tragic. Not only in the UK, but the United States and some cities of Germany. There was a lot to be said for keeping true to the original designs of classical passenger railroad stations built in our larger cities. They told the riders one message they couldn't forget upon arriving at their destinations. As we'd say in the US, "we're not in Kansas anymore, Toto." And that's what they were supposed to do, convey a greater sense of importance. You're no longer in the sticks. It might've seemed arrogant, but what's the point of letting the hayseeds and their duller than watching paint dry architects have the final say when it comes to designing public structures. The Bolshies are history and let's keep them penned in the dullest drabbest corner where they belong.

[@JP_TaVeryMuch]

Don't worry I automatically have wiped them from memory. Because they started a sentence with because. And then because they did it again. Thought they knew the krek waiter's peak back then!

[@michaelstaley2241]

Very good commentary cut glass accent people took a pride then…

[@simonwinn387]

Love this

[@stevegibbs3943]

Damn, I want to live in that world

[@jamesburnside3023]

Fantastic

[@grahamfrear9270]

Why did we have to lose those beautiful stations. To be replaced by all those dreadful replacement buildings. It makes me weep 🚧

[@jimeditorial]

By the look of all this modernity, British Rail must be very close to perfection.

[@elboobio5920]

Unfortunately this modernisation that happened 60 years ago is still exactly the same today, Manchester Oxford Road looks almost identical today, so they're about 60 years behind again

[@briansearle4138]

Geoff Barry , I think what the issue really is that what we see is that , It was all designed and built in Britain and the real end of British Engineering In this field . The world caught us up in the end plus our weak kneed governments didn't help , also they didn't give a fuck then and now .

[@andyg3]

It was all down hill from here

[@srfurley]

Do you have any other Reports on Modernisation after this one?

[@Pjs75]

As they say on TV “That was a party political broadcast on behalf of ...” in this case the ‘British Transport. Commision’ that, at that time, had governmental oversight of Road, Rail and marine operations in a ‘Nationalised’ structure. But this was to be swept away by the new government thinking of free marketeers, leading to the isolation of a ‘British Railways Board’ in preparation for the implementation of the Beeching Report - a pure cost saving exercise, pushed along by politicians; including Ernest Maples the minister of Transport over several years, who was predisposed to road building as a shareholder in Marples Ridgeway civil engineers. A glaring conflict of interest? He did not implement Beeching, as they lost the next election, but Barbara Castle, {of different political colour - including her red hair}, was constrained by the Treasury and the stop/go financial situation. The machinations of Marples, who eventually fled the country (overnight) for a tax haven, {when 30 years of back tax loomed} had planted the seeds for destruction of the infrastructure that appeared so vital and thrusting in this film.

[@mce_AU]

Modern NX panel at 17:00

[@donsharpe5786]

The comment about the gracious riding of the diesel pullman was hilarious, it was not good. The HSTs were more comfortable than they were. You could get a decent meal on them though.

[@jimthorne304]

I made a couple of trips on them, and it was like riding a bike over corrugated iron sheets!

[@davidmansell5986]

Quite right! The meals were good as long as you didn't mind the soup in your lap, apparently!

[@allanegleston4931]

are any of these goods depots and marshelling yards still there ? as from a person from the usa. thanks .

[@dolvaran]

No - all gone many years ago

[@davidreed9671]

Yes, part of the yard at Newport, Tees yard, is still used.

[@jameseadie7145]

Don’t think they got 30 years out of Perth yard

[@TheWacoKid1963]

I don't think they got that long out of Lamesley/Tyne yard

[@phaasch]

"Just look at all these fentestic achievements - it's hard to imegine they in just 2 years from now, a change of government policy, and a new Transport Minister will make us all realise thet most of this is just totally unaffordable pie- in-the-sky, and thet the Car is in fact, King. And how we will all laugh...". :((

[@sisi2484]

Do you have the 3rd rail report . Seems not be on KZbin anymore

[@ghosthorse77]

It did not work out as Beaching came along and destroyed the railways.

[@ByOnu21]

What type of stock is that at 7:35? :)

[@powerslide12]

London Underground R stock on the District Line. Built during the 1950s.

[@robertwatt9012]

Not a "Customer" in earshot!

[@bobtudbury8505]

thank you labour for closing all the lines

[@routeman680]

It was Beeching and the Conservatives who came up with the closure plan.

[@bobtudbury8505]

@@routeman680 you are clueless, the railways were losing £100.000 a day !! , yes he was bought in to sort it, However no one acted on the list until labour got hold of it in 1965..LABOUR CLOSED THE LINES then gave beeching an award , also labour closed 100's of pits in the 60's and saved NONE in the 90's , do your home work before you bother me again

[@routeman680]

@@bobtudbury8505 "Bother" you?! LOL.

[@bobtudbury8505]

@@routeman680 what you on about? LOL LOL , jeez

[@martyncarroll5035]

One of the railway vandalism Was when labour closed the the Line through LITTLE SWITZERLAND (Matlock to Buxton and Chinley) To go from Buxton To Matlock It takes Four hours By Train Buxton to Stockport Stockport to Sheffield Sheffield To Derby Derby To Matlock And they say it’s quicker by Train!!!! We should invest in RAIlWAYS NOT ROADS It takes one hour by bus We want more managers like Gerry Fiennes And Chris Green Who knew how to run a Railway Gerry Fiennes Wrote A Book I TRIED TO RUN A RAILWAY A certain Politician Did not like it which go him the sack Ernest Marples And Doctor Richard Beeching ruined the railways Of Britain

[@hogyndrwg6253]

A fascinating and welcome collection of images of that era but pure propaganda worthy of the erstwhile Soviet Union.

[@stephensmith799]

Who said state-owned enterprises are not innovative and had to be privatised?! Rubbish!

[@beakytzw]

What a shame it all went wrong, some one changed a policy and down it went.

[@spatrompete2601]

The MAN 👨 just imagine some says that today

[@dlsplastics]

11:01 People Are Awesome 1961?

[@williamwaynflete6336]

Hmmm... Handel's Fireworks Music by brass band is a rather odd choice of music...

[@mcgloinm1]

You might ask(or you might not ask) why doesn't USofA have a national public service? Well, if you ask what the difference between how much energy is used between using trains and cars using gas. Well there it is.

[@mtsenskmtsensk5113]

Mike mcgloin what is your point, that America wants to use more energy to move people about by car, to or uses less energy to move people by car?

[@mediacityavid]

Surely even the folk back there didn't fall for this over sentimental vision of the future. BR was always at the mercy of the unions.

[@cjmillsnun]

Just the unions or more accurately the car and the lorry?

[@saltspringrailway3683]

and the politicians.

[@ianmurray250]

Many of the current rules safety features have the unions to thank, standing up for the employee, such as enough time off between duties so employees are not so tired as to make a mistake and kill people. The people of the World have a lot to thank unions for, after all, if they weren't so good, the Conservative press wouldn't go out of it's way to rubbish them.

[@meanwhileme4128]

@@ianmurray250 Unions the saviours of the working classes the Conservatives nothing but Tory Vermin

[@jonahspiper]

6:48 The navvy driving the dumper in a suit got a lot more done then than anyone now in bright orange, a hard hat, with a pointless certificate to work and a stupid degree.

[@jarrowmarrow]

That architecture update didn't hold up through time. It looked cheap even when it was new. Allot was demolished thankfully.

[@davidreed9671]

And we were doing all this without any need for foreign workers . .. ...

[@ianmurray250]

1961, you're kidding right, loads of workers from India & the Caribbean.

[@davidreed9671]

@@ianmurray250 1961 - you weren't there, l was and they weren't, no matter how much they try to pretend otherwise in period portrayals on modern TV. Only London had a smattering. Look at the 1961 census.

[@nounoufriend1442]

Now most freight is on the road network ,with thousands of lorry's and were suppose to be looking after our world FFS its a joke ,we were far greener then

[@paulnicholson1906]

Milk came in reusable bottles, no plastic packaging dustbins had “dust” in them 😀, many less cars on the road as well.

[@davidreay5911]

@11.11 Little Geoffrey Bezos said to his mom. "That's what I'm going to do when I'm a big boy". And so it came to pass. 👁💋👁

[@johnmayberry7669]

Not one fat person in this film...

[@adrianpeters2413]

Oh look ..at society reaping what the society paid for ! Amazing theory is tax being used for whome payed the tax,

[@atilllathehun1212]

Ah what times. People just getting on with it and no snowflakes dribbling on about 'diversity'.......

[@johnstudd4245]

Or Sodomites strutting around like peacocks.

[@JP_TaVeryMuch]

0:12 TUT TUT! Starting a sentence, let alone a paragraph or even a government backed film! Poor show indeed.

[@colliecandle]

Propaganda - at it's finest !

[@eddieafterburner]

Grammar … at it is finest!

[@gainsbourg66]

Awful music nearly made me stop listening