Your details will only be used by the Museum and suppliers working on our behalf and you can unsubscribe at any time. Pivotal moments including the Amalgamation of 1923 when most railway companies became part of the GWR, LMSR, or LNER, nationalization and privatization are set in their historical context. This opened the way for managers like Chris Green who achieved legendary and cult status amongst many rail enthusiasts with his skilful branding and revolutionary approach to revitalising the networks which came under his control. Takes its time to get going, and parts of it read like long disconnected lists of line openings and closures. The “victim of its history” argument is certainly a clear and powerful one that pulls together the essence of what many railway studies scholars have been.

If you are already well familiar with the history of British rail, this book will do little to enhance or challenge your understanding.

Born into postwar austerity, impoverished, and exploited by a hostile press, British Rail became a punchline, dismissed and swept away by Conservative government. Wolmar’s book serves, in part, as a punch against the often persistent narratives of stagnation and decline that have dominated perceptions of rail transport in Britain. Using the trains in Great Britain is a difficult and often frustrating experience for many; following the privatisation of the railways in the 1990s, passengers are often treated to confusing timetables, frequent delays and ever-increasing fares. Photographs and drawings appear at the end of the book almost as an afterthought, and with little or no direct connection to the main text. In this comprehensive history, Colin Maggs, one of the country's foremost railway historians, tells the story of over 400 years of British railway history.

This is an excellent account of the history of British Rail and ultimately the making and breaking of a national institution.It's not that the railway management itself was without faults - particularly in the way that the old regions, reflecting the four private companies that were taken over, tried to still do things their own way. No maps, diagrams or photos to illustrate the text, which is made all the worse for poor descriptive writing. A pacy and very detailed history of British Rail from its formation in 1948 to its carving up by privatisation in 1997. Its awkward name – part throwback to BR, part patriotic boosterism in the Boris Johnson mould, part aspiration – speaks to the uncertainty facing Britain’s railways.