Beeching's Legacy - The Reshaping of Britain's Railways

This is the story of how around 150 pre-Grouping railways of Britain evolved from their 'Golden Age' in the heady Edwardian era to become the less popular nationalised British Railways. It fell to Dr Richard Beeching, Chairman of the British Railways Board (1961-1965) to wield his axe in order to achieve the Government's ambition of turning the railways back into profit. With the use of extensive and rare archive footage, this series examines Beeching's legacy as we commemorate 50 years since his infamous report The Reshaping of British Railways was published.