@@AlanCanon2222 Nostalgia is a strange thing. I had the same reaction to a film of a derelict, disused amusement park in New York - where I have never been.
I was a train spotter back in those days. Even got to hitch rides on the footplate. Before the days of health and safety... Many thanks to the drivers and stokers, now, no doubt deceased. 👍
Thank you for watching, I never was a train spotter, although I always enjoyed seeing them and riding in them. I envy your footplate rides, though I have chatted to the driver on the footplate of a Beatie Well Tank at Bodmin and Wenford 'oh that smell', I do now have a model railway based on late 40's-50's Southern Branch Lines. I will join with you the accolade to the crews of those wonderful times.
It's one of those songs that I would hate to hear covered by anybody else. Flanders' and Swann's voices uniquely conjure up the era and the Englishness.
If only the Ministry of Transport could have delayed the closures of the lines or at least mothballed them and retained the track-beds .It was a short-sighted decision that now seems a foolish measure given the overcrowded roads today with all the pollution problems that go with it but hindsight is a wonderful thing as they say.
Anthem for the end of an era. my grandkids wont ever know the kind of experience that their grandmother had, takin the "slow train" to school and back every day, just like it was a school bus.
In the Depression (1930s), my grandmother caught the train from tiny Murray, Kentucky to tiny Water Valley every day to teach school. One afternoon, she fell asleep on the train and missed her stop. The conductor had the engineer stop the train, and back up, all the way to the previous town, to get her where she needed to be. Grandmother and the train are both long gone, the trackbed changed into a public hiking path (the so called "rails to trails" program). Someday I'd like to walk that segment of it, knowing the story she told me.
Beautiful rhyming lyrics with a poignant accompaniment! A bittersweet tribute to a bygone era of travel. Memorable tunes by Swann and brilliant poetry by Flanders.
Thank you for making this outstanding little video - co-ordinating photographs of some of the stations named, and photographs of general railway scenes to which the song alludes.
@@ro9202 Thank you! I'm a huge Anglophile though I've only visited your sceptred isle once. If I ever come back I'll be torn between seeing new things, and revisiting the old favourites.
This a lovely offering, well thought out and poignant. Branch line reinstatement and rebuilding has to be the most effective way forward for Britain. Three cheers for branch lines! Thankyou so much for posting this.
The self interest of politicians in this example, almost completely destroyed a very usefull infrastructure, that ony needed a little pruning. Thank you for watching.
Great upload,thank you.This song makes me so sad,but brings back memories of wonderful hours spent with my mates on stations now long gone.Pye Hill and Pye Bridge were a short walk,Ambergate a bike ride.Simple pleasures , no video games,mobile phones,just talking and laughing together till the next train passed.Wouldn't swap with todays youth for anything.
skoot2u thank you for the kind comment, when we were young we thought the world around us would last forever the way it was. some things changed for the better. but we seem to be stuck with change for changes sake and it make life 'bland', and not the simple but rich experience we had. take care and all the best...
@@barleyarrish Changes for changes same is part of everything now. Executives and officials are judged only by what they've changed, not how well the change worked. It more often didn't work.
Frances Van Siclen perhaps some of them... it would have been nice to have kept goods traffic on rail and off the road and kept a lot of the branch lines. also it would have been very nice to have not trashed the steam trains, steam is a very rich experience and todays children still get very excited in their presence. more modern and efficient trains for longer journeys are fine but they offer very little in terms of visual appeal, smell sound ect, heavens we have now lost the clickety-clack! thank heavens we still have the preserved railways, which tend to do alright. but on the whole I agree with your comment.
This song, wedded to this video, make a true gem of post-war Britain nostalgia. It is very evocative of times gone by, and one can't help but think of the lives of our grandparents, and the slower pace of everything then. It was so appropriate to photograph the stations, now with no trains in them, and the grass growing between the sleepers - "the sleepers sleep at Ordlan and Ambergate". "They've all passed out of our lives" ... sadly, like Flanders and Swann. Many of the lines, now derelict - the cost of progress - but one questions whether that's really what it is. "No-one departs and no-one arrives", I think is a nod to Edward Thomas's poem "Adlestrop"... The steam hissed. Someone cleared his throat. No one left and no one came On the bare platform. What I saw Was "Adlestrop"-only the name
so very true, another musician created the sound of a steam engine, the late kieth moon on his drum kit in 'ivor the engine driver' by the who. worlds apart but as you say pure genius, donald swann helped weave the tapestry of a cherished and loved epoch.
Of course the reason Ernest Marples was pro road was that he was the Marples in Marples Ridgeway a company that built........ wait for it........... yes, you've guessed it............. roads!
Miller's Dale for Tideswell ... Kirby Muxloe ... Mow Cop and Scholar Green ... No more will I go to Blandford Forum and Mortehoe On the slow train from Midsomer Norton and Mumby Road No churns, no porter, no cat on a seat At Chorlton-cum-Hardy or Chester-le-Street We won't be meeting again On the Slow Train. I'll travel no more from Littleton Badsey to Openshaw At Long Stanton I'll stand well clear of the doors no more No whitewashed pebbles, no up and no down From Formby Four Crosses to Dunstable Town I won't be going again On the Slow Train. On the Main Line and the goods' siding The grass grows high At Dog Dyke, Tumby Woodside And Trouble House Halt. The sleepers sleep at Audlem and Ambergate. No passenger waits on Chittening platform or Cheslyn Hay No one departs, no one arrives From Selby to Goole, from St Erth to St Ives They've all passed out of our lives On the Slow Train, on the Slow Train. Cockermouth for Buttermere ... On the Slow Train, Armley Moor Arram ... Pye Hill and Somercotes ... On the Slow Train Windmill End.
Yes I agree very sad, and a good illustration of the self interest of earnest marples mp who had to flee Britain to avoid a trial over corruption. Not much has changed in Government, still a bunch of self serving (when not serving the world economic forum) parasites. Thank you for watching and I wish you good health and all the luck in the world.
I have chosen this song - and, if we can fix a video as well - and this video to be played at my funeral. It's a perfect farewell. Many thanks barleyarrish for posting it.
It was in fact played at the funeral of David Fairhurst, secretary of Watford Branch of the Railway Correspondence and Travel Society several years ago
Yes, Well................ St Ives (as pictured) is not closed, it has a train service, the station is still open. Guess there had to be one, or are there more?
I have heard that quite a few branch lines survived. It's a shame that Lelant lost it's station building to a cafe, but the platform is there and is still in use, this branch from St Earth, Lelant, Carbis Bay, St Ives is still very much used, both by Local and Holiday traffic. And is just round the Corner to me.
It's remarkable how many of these stations are either in a small village or completely isolated. As the video points out, a few of the more-used stations were ultimately spared "The Axe."
Thank you so much for this wonderfully put together video. Thanks also to the photographers who captured the dying embers of our railways. What a destructive, vindictive and utterly foolish thing Beeching did and how we need these lines now.
The names for the sing were taken from the list of proposed closures that was printed in a newspaper. There is a thought that the running together of names such as Armley Moor Allam is because of the way the list was printed.
Cheslyn Hay... That is such a beautiful name ,I would have got off the slow train for a look about! I hope the concert went well Angela, thank you for watching and commenting.
@@barleyarrish I was not born when the Beeching reforms and Ernest Maples put paid to these railway lines. What I know about that period of history is second hand knowledge.
Newport Pagnell, Great Linford, New Bradwell & Wolverton branch line is now a footpath with the occasional station platform thanks to the Beaching axe. The bus from Newport Pagnell through Milton Keynes to Wolverton takes twice as long as the train did, old Nobby Newport is still quicker.
Said 40 years ago that the damage done by Beeching was criminal. Looking back now from 2024 and the "times we are in" it was an insane decision. Mothballing would have made much more sense in my opinion.
We must be fair to Beeching. He insisted that the rail lines shoudbe closed (not built on). The Culprit and the criminal (he fled the Country to avoid retribution) was Ernest Marples! He was in favour of Road Traffic and had interests in roads. There was a movement after the war for closer tie's to the Continent and this was the start of the long slow death of Great Britain as an Industrial inervator and Giant. Never trust a polyitician!
Many thanks for this,i am building a route in Train Simulator 2014 that is an Homage to this song,now i have some actual pics to base my stations on! Thanks again!
all the named stations, are correct, of the unnamed stations only trouble house halt is right, the others are infill as i could not find them anywhere, if you post your creation give me a shout so i can see your work, sounds a great idea, all the best!
bigmull Coming on!Trouble House Halt done(need to add the foliage etc),Audlem also done.I have had to make some concessions due to the modles and assets i have to play with so they wont be 100% correct but i am to get them as close as Possible.
There are also some odd little closed lines in strange places, eg the Highgate to Alexandra Palace branch line in London (calling at Cranley Gardens and Muswell Hill). Closed 1971, now a woodland walk with some bits and pieces of railway hardware still visible.
@@rogerherts Passenger traffic from Finsbury Park to Alexandra Palace stopped in 1954, and the line closed from Highgate to Ally Pally. However the line from Finsbury Park to Highgate remained open till 1971 - mainly for tube train movements.
Closures peaked in at just over 1000 miles in 1964 but let's not lose sight of the fact that in the Labour years of the Wilson Govt between 65 and 70 over 2000 miles were closed when Barbara Castle among others was Minister for Transport
Listening to this while facing yet another potential lockdown, social distancing, mask wearing, booster jabs, travel restrictions, covid passports, and so on. Please, someone take me back to a simpler time.
Thank you for watching. Even in the slow train days plans were already being formed for current events. Non compliance with dictators worked before no reason it should fail this time. Whatever your position i wish you a happy Christmas and the new year you would like to see in your heart.
The Appleton Report at the time called for the disused rail routes be protected as continuous walking, cycling and riding routes and not sold off bits and pieces. They were offered to local highway authorities at cut prices but even then local highway authority councillors and officers were only interested in providing for cars. Oddly Marples was a keen cyclist but owned a big road construction firm which did very well from road building roads - conflict of interest?
indeed it came home to me when i was given a section of track recently, it is only 24" long but it sure takes some lifting! the effort of establishing a large rail network like we had in terms of resources, manufacture man hours and skills was a magnificent achievement.
PS. I think at the beginning of the song the station of Meols Cop (locally pronounced as Mells Cop) is mentioned, this station is still up and running and is just outside of Southport in Merseyside UK.
+richiexl5 no - It is Mow Cop and Scholar Green. Near Congleton in Cheshire. A few of the stations mentioned actually got reprieved such as St Erth and St Ives for example.
Mow Cop (rhymes with Cow mop) is a village on the border of Staffordshire and Cheshire. It's best known for it's 18th century folly at the summit of a gritstone ridge. The county boundary runs through the middle of the folly because of a land dispute between two wealthy families.
i will start off by saying that i am a full blood american that lives in america and i love british railways. i know beeching was just doing his job but i must say that i hate him. he scrapped so many beautiful steam locomotives. especially class A4 silver link. he should have preserved silver link for sure.
Hi Dylan, a happy new year to you. I'm afraid you have your history a bit wrong. Dr Beeching was appointed by Minister of Transport Ernest Marples to Rationalise the Rail Network and to remove rail services that were unprofitable or duplicate. Which is what this song is about the disappearance of many of this Country's branch lines. Steam Locomotives wer nothing to do with Beeching, their disappearance was part of a post war modernization program. In fact electrification of lines had started in some regions in the early 1900's. I am no fan of Dr Beeching but I think it unfair to 'hate' him for something that he had nothing at all to do with. If you like A4 Silver Link you can find an old B&W film starring Will Hay here on youtube called 'oh Mr porter' in the early scenes of the film Will Hay is a wheel Tapper working along the wheels of Silver Link. You might find the film very funny.
The status of the stations. Miller's Dale Gone, Kirby Muxloe gone but line still present, Mow Cop & Scholar Green gone, Blandford Forum gone, Mortehoe gone, Midsomer Norton gone, Mumby Road gone, Chorlton Cum Hardy reopened as light rail, Chester Le Street spared, Littleton & Badsey gone, Openshaw spared, Long Stanton reopened as guided busway, Formby spared, Four Crosses gone, Dunstable Town gone, Dogdyke gone, Tumby Woodside gone, Trouble House Halt gone, Audlem gone, Ambergate spared, Chittening Platform gone, Cheslyn Hay gone, Selby and Goole Spared (but linking line gone), St Erth to St Ives spared due to politics (marginal seat!), Cockermouth gone, Armley Moor gone, Arram spared, Pye Hill and Somercotes gone, Windmill End gone...
Good job! To think they closed all those lines to save a few bob, and what have we to show for it now, apart from billions being wasted on other interminable money pits... ?
And that is all part of the beauty of English names, I have a difficult one, but...Then I live in Cornwall and the pronounciation of a great many place names, is even got wrong by born and bred Cornish... Thank you for watching and hopefully enjoying.
![BLACK BAG - Official Trailer [HD] - Only in Theaters March 14](http://i.ytimg.com/vi/Du0Xp8WX_7I/mqdefault.jpg)
The effort that went into the video is much appreciated - wonderfully done. Strangely moving.
a heart felt thank you, for you comment, all the best x
I agree, the song makes me cry even though I'm American and never set foot on a British railway carriage (outside the Tube).
@@AlanCanon2222 Nostalgia is a strange thing. I had the same reaction to a film of a derelict, disused amusement park in New York - where I have never been.
I was a train spotter back in those days. Even got to hitch rides on the footplate. Before the days of health and safety... Many thanks to the drivers and stokers, now, no doubt deceased. 👍
Thank you for watching, I never was a train spotter, although I always enjoyed seeing them
and riding in them. I envy your footplate rides, though I have chatted to the driver on the footplate of a Beatie Well Tank at Bodmin and Wenford 'oh that smell', I do now have a model railway based on late 40's-50's Southern Branch Lines. I will join with you the accolade to the crews
of those wonderful times.
It's one of those songs that I would hate to hear covered by anybody else. Flanders' and Swann's voices uniquely conjure up the era and the Englishness.
Lemon Jelly did a 'version ' of the slow train, but apart from the title, thankfully there are no other similarities.
If only the Ministry of Transport could have delayed the closures of the lines or at least
mothballed them and retained the track-beds .It was a short-sighted decision that now seems a foolish measure given the overcrowded roads today with all the pollution problems that go with it but hindsight is a wonderful thing as they say.
I must have some grit in my eyes. Tears flowing
Yes.
Anthem for the end of an era. my grandkids wont ever know the kind of experience that their grandmother had, takin the "slow train" to school and back every day, just like it was a school bus.
In the Depression (1930s), my grandmother caught the train from tiny Murray, Kentucky to tiny Water Valley every day to teach school. One afternoon, she fell asleep on the train and missed her stop. The conductor had the engineer stop the train, and back up, all the way to the previous town, to get her where she needed to be. Grandmother and the train are both long gone, the trackbed changed into a public hiking path (the so called "rails to trails" program). Someday I'd like to walk that segment of it, knowing the story she told me.
So sad, so charming so nostalgic thanks to all concerned.
Beautiful rhyming lyrics with a poignant accompaniment! A bittersweet tribute to a bygone era of travel. Memorable tunes by Swann and brilliant poetry by Flanders.
I love the piano at the last sounding like the
last breath of a steam engine...
Thank you for watching James, all the best to you!
Thank you for making this outstanding little video - co-ordinating photographs of some of the stations named, and photographs of general railway scenes to which the song alludes.
Thank you it is very kind of you.
I am learning the hell out of this on guitar, at long last. God I love this song. Love from Kentucky.
Bless you!
Greetings from the UK. Actually, I am not far from Kirby Muxloe!!!
@@ro9202 Thank you! I'm a huge Anglophile though I've only visited your sceptred isle once. If I ever come back I'll be torn between seeing new things, and revisiting the old favourites.
@@ro9202 and I'm not far from Chester-le-Street...
I live not too far from Cheslyn Hay!
This a lovely offering, well thought out and poignant. Branch line reinstatement and rebuilding has to be the most effective way forward for Britain. Three cheers for branch lines! Thankyou so much for posting this.
At this point all we can hope for is an inverse Beeching act (i.e. removing a lot of roads, preferably highways or motorways).
I was never a railway enthusiast, but this gets me every time. Just wonderful.
The dotted notes - so 'slovenly' and precise at the same time. I love it!
Very evocative.The legacy of the rail cuts:ghastly crowded motorways and huge thundering juggernauts. MADNESS!!!!!!
The self interest of politicians in this example, almost completely destroyed a very usefull infrastructure, that ony needed a little pruning. Thank you for watching.
Many thanks from those of us who wondered about these lovely, nostalgia-filled lyrics. What perfect images!
Thank you Teresa...
Wonderful how you managed to collect so many pictures of these stations - such an evocative video to go with the genius of Flanders and Swann!
Thank you so much, all the best!
Great upload,thank you.This song makes me so sad,but brings back memories of wonderful hours spent with my mates on stations now long gone.Pye Hill and Pye Bridge were a short walk,Ambergate a bike ride.Simple pleasures , no video games,mobile phones,just talking and laughing together till the next train passed.Wouldn't swap with todays youth for anything.
skoot2u
thank you for the kind comment, when we were young we thought the world around us would last forever the way it was. some things changed for the better. but we seem to be stuck with change for changes sake and it make life 'bland', and not the simple but rich experience we had. take care and all the best...
Do kids laugh together at all these days I wonder? I can't recall hearing it.
@@barleyarrish Changes for changes same is part of everything now. Executives and officials are judged only by what they've changed, not how well the change worked. It more often didn't work.
@@hughtierney9109 They don't. My mates and I used to sit for ages on the little wall outside the shops just laughing about anything and nothing.
@@zacmumblethunder7466
Uk Column.org good people!
I want the old ways back !!!!!!
Frances Van Siclen
perhaps some of them... it would have been nice to have kept goods traffic on rail and off the road and kept a lot of the branch lines.
also it would have been very nice to have not trashed the steam trains, steam is a very rich experience and todays children still get very excited in their presence. more modern and efficient trains for longer journeys are fine but they offer very little in terms of visual appeal, smell sound ect, heavens we have now lost the clickety-clack! thank heavens we still have the preserved railways, which tend to do alright. but on the whole I agree with your comment.
Along with the video, this amounts to a classic masterpiece. Most beautiful. Thank you.
This song, wedded to this video, make a true gem of post-war Britain nostalgia.
It is very evocative of times gone by, and one can't help but think of the lives of our grandparents, and the slower pace of everything then.
It was so appropriate to photograph the stations, now with no trains in them, and the grass growing between the sleepers - "the sleepers sleep at Ordlan and Ambergate".
"They've all passed out of our lives" ... sadly, like Flanders and Swann. Many of the lines, now derelict - the cost of progress - but one questions whether that's really what it is.
"No-one departs and no-one arrives", I think is a nod to Edward Thomas's poem "Adlestrop"...
The steam hissed. Someone cleared his throat.
No one left and no one came
On the bare platform. What I saw
Was "Adlestrop"-only the name
Love this comment!
I keep coming back to this bittersweet song and evocative pictures. Beautiful.
thank you richard
Me too!
Swann's piano is reminiscent of a steam train idling past. Genius.
so very true, another musician created the sound of a steam engine, the late kieth moon on his drum kit in 'ivor the engine driver' by the who. worlds apart but as you say pure genius, donald swann helped weave the tapestry of a cherished
and loved epoch.
Of course the reason Ernest Marples was pro road was that he was the Marples in Marples Ridgeway a company that built........ wait for it........... yes, you've guessed it............. roads!
Miller's Dale for Tideswell ...
Kirby Muxloe ...
Mow Cop and Scholar Green ...
No more will I go to Blandford Forum and Mortehoe
On the slow train from Midsomer Norton and Mumby Road
No churns, no porter, no cat on a seat
At Chorlton-cum-Hardy or Chester-le-Street
We won't be meeting again
On the Slow Train.
I'll travel no more from Littleton Badsey to Openshaw
At Long Stanton I'll stand well clear of the doors no more
No whitewashed pebbles, no up and no down
From Formby Four Crosses to Dunstable Town
I won't be going again
On the Slow Train.
On the Main Line and the goods' siding
The grass grows high
At Dog Dyke, Tumby Woodside
And Trouble House Halt.
The sleepers sleep at Audlem and Ambergate.
No passenger waits on Chittening platform or Cheslyn Hay
No one departs, no one arrives
From Selby to Goole, from St Erth to St Ives
They've all passed out of our lives
On the Slow Train, on the Slow Train.
Cockermouth for Buttermere ...
On the Slow Train, Armley Moor Arram ...
Pye Hill and Somercotes ...
On the Slow Train
Windmill End.
This breaks my heart
Yes I agree very sad, and a good illustration of the self interest of earnest marples mp who had to flee Britain to avoid a trial over corruption. Not much has changed in Government, still a bunch of self serving (when not serving the world economic forum) parasites. Thank you for watching and I wish you good health and all the luck in the world.
A nostalgic look at a vanished more slow age!
I'm pleased you enjoyed it Michael, thank you for watching.
I have chosen this song - and, if we can fix a video as well - and this video to be played at my funeral. It's a perfect farewell.
Many thanks barleyarrish for posting it.
all the very best to you, on your journey!
It was in fact played at the funeral of David Fairhurst, secretary of Watford Branch of the Railway Correspondence and Travel Society several years ago
We played it for my Dad's 'virtual' funeral in April 2020, during lockdown
Surely the best and most careful compilation of pictures to match this poignant song. Thanks.
Andrew Emm
Thank you Andrew
Yes, Well................ St Ives (as pictured) is not closed, it has a train service, the station is still open. Guess there had to be one, or are there more?
I have heard that quite a few branch lines survived. It's a shame that Lelant lost it's station building to a cafe, but the platform is there and is still in use, this branch from St Earth, Lelant, Carbis Bay, St Ives is still very much used, both by Local and Holiday traffic. And is just round the Corner to me.
It's remarkable how many of these stations are either in a small village or completely isolated. As the video points out, a few of the more-used stations were ultimately spared "The Axe."
Thank you so much for this wonderfully put together video.
Thanks also to the photographers who captured the dying embers of our railways.
What a destructive, vindictive and utterly foolish thing Beeching did and how we need these lines now.
I'm so pleased you enjoyed the video, I like your comments.
Beautiful, sad. Wonderful old photos.
Cheslyn Hay station was reopened a while back and is in use again. I love the song though as i do with most of Flanders and Swanns work.
Very sad and lovely, but I have to report (having travelled on it only yesterday) that the slow train does still run from St Erth to St Ives.
indeed it does, albeit at a sprint!
thank you for watching, and all credit to F&S.
as a west cornwall man I do like to travel those metals myself.
Hello again just checked out your channel, got to say I like your taste in music! subscribed.
The names for the sing were taken from the list of proposed closures that was printed in a newspaper. There is a thought that the running together of names such as Armley Moor Allam is because of the way the list was printed.
This was performed at a concert that I played at some years ago. I happen to live a few miles from Cheslyn Hay!
Cheslyn Hay... That is such a beautiful name ,I would have got off the slow train for a look about!
I hope the concert went well Angela, thank you for watching and commenting.
@@barleyarrish I was not born when the Beeching reforms and Ernest Maples put paid to these railway lines. What I know about that period of history is second hand knowledge.
Beautifully done. The video is a great accompaniment to a beautiful, nostalgic masterpiece!
thank you so much david...
Newport Pagnell, Great Linford, New Bradwell & Wolverton branch line is now a footpath with the occasional station platform thanks to the Beaching axe.
The bus from Newport Pagnell through Milton Keynes to Wolverton takes twice as long as the train did, old Nobby Newport is still quicker.
Lovely Danny.
Flanders and swann are wonderful.
My favourite is the Gas man Cometh.
Love the Gas Man! Broken Bedsteads in the Pond is another, oh so many good ones...thanks for watching.
Said 40 years ago that the damage done by Beeching was criminal. Looking back now from 2024 and the "times we are in" it was an insane decision. Mothballing would have made much more sense in my opinion.
We must be fair to Beeching. He insisted that the rail lines shoudbe closed (not built on). The Culprit and the criminal (he fled the Country to avoid retribution) was Ernest Marples! He was in favour of Road Traffic and had interests in roads. There was a movement after the war for closer tie's to the Continent and this was the start of the long slow death of Great Britain as an Industrial inervator and Giant. Never trust a polyitician!
Many thanks for this,i am building a route in Train Simulator 2014 that is an Homage to this song,now i have some actual pics to base my stations on! Thanks again!
all the named stations, are correct, of the unnamed stations only trouble house halt is right, the others are infill as i could not find them anywhere, if you post your creation give me a shout so i can see your work, sounds a great idea, all the best!
Of course i will,you can see the progress sp far on the UKtrainsim site.
Its on the route building forum as the F&S Line.
bigmull
many thanks for this, all the best
bigmull Coming on!Trouble House Halt done(need to add the foliage etc),Audlem also done.I have had to make some concessions due to the modles and assets i have to play with so they wont be 100% correct but i am to get them as close as Possible.
There are also some odd little closed lines in strange places, eg the Highgate to Alexandra Palace branch line in London (calling at Cranley Gardens and Muswell Hill). Closed 1971, now a woodland walk with some bits and pieces of railway hardware still visible.
That line closed in 1954!
@@rogerherts Passenger traffic from Finsbury Park to Alexandra Palace stopped in 1954, and the line closed from Highgate to Ally Pally. However the line from Finsbury Park to Highgate remained open till 1971 - mainly for tube train movements.
Not only did Ernest Marples believe in road over rail, he owned a company which built roads, including some of the early motorways.
Thank you for the wonderful photographs.
a pleasure my dear sir
Closures peaked in at just over 1000 miles in 1964 but let's not lose sight of the fact that in the Labour years of the Wilson Govt between 65 and 70 over 2000 miles were closed when Barbara Castle among others was Minister for Transport
Listening to this while facing yet another potential lockdown, social distancing, mask wearing, booster jabs, travel restrictions, covid passports, and so on. Please, someone take me back to a simpler time.
Thank you for watching. Even in the slow train days plans were already being formed for current events. Non compliance with dictators worked before no reason it should fail this time. Whatever your position i wish you a happy Christmas and
the new year you would like to see in your heart.
This is also the only song in the world AFAIK that contains a reference to my last name, Openshaw. Parish of Manchester, I believe.
Wonderfully evocative piece. Now I could do with a BR pork pie and a cup of tea you could stand your spoon up in.
Peter Baxter
i join you in that sentiment peter
Brilliant video and nostalgia in bucket loads although Cheslyn Hay is now open again
Thank you Superamos, very good news on Cheslyn Hay
Many thanks
I loved it! I laughed from beginning to end, from arrival to departure!
This actually sent shivers down me
erm, yes, well thanks for watching, I hope
the experience was a nice one...
@@barleyarrish absolutely, just double nostalgia for the vintage pics and for Flanders and Swann
@@Julia-bn1ps yes it gets me that way to.
The Appleton Report at the time called for the disused rail routes be protected as continuous walking, cycling and riding routes and not sold off bits and pieces. They were offered to local highway authorities at cut prices but even then local highway authority councillors and officers were only interested in providing for cars. Oddly Marples was a keen cyclist but owned a big road construction firm which did very well from road building roads - conflict of interest?
Yes Marples had to flee the Country...
I have asked for The Slow Train to be considered tonight as a song on R5
Wonderful stuff. And think of what we've lost.
indeed it came home to me when i was given a section of track recently, it is only 24" long but it sure takes some lifting! the effort of establishing a large rail network like we had in terms of resources, manufacture man hours and skills was a magnificent achievement.
Very true. Real engineering skills at work.
Brilliant 👌🚂
I'm pleased you enjoyed it, all credit though to F&S
PS. I think at the beginning of the song the station of Meols Cop (locally pronounced as Mells Cop) is mentioned, this station is still up and running and is just outside of Southport in Merseyside UK.
+richiexl5 no - It is Mow Cop and Scholar Green. Near Congleton in Cheshire. A few of the stations mentioned actually got reprieved such as St Erth and St Ives for example.
'Meols Cop' is pronounced 'Meels Cop'.
Mow Cop (rhymes with Cow mop) is a village on the border of Staffordshire and Cheshire. It's best known for it's 18th century folly at the summit of a gritstone ridge. The county boundary runs through the middle of the folly because of a land dispute between two wealthy families.
Great work.
cheers
Beautiful.
thank you clikky
Many seem to overlook the fact that implementation (of parts of the Beeching Report) was effected by the Labour Government from Oct 1964.
All part of a long term agenda which we are now seeing coming to fruition.
England.
yes
i will start off by saying that i am a full blood american that lives in america and i love british railways. i know beeching was just doing his job but i must say that i hate him. he scrapped so many beautiful steam locomotives. especially class A4 silver link. he should have preserved silver link for sure.
Hi Dylan, a happy new year to you.
I'm afraid you have your history a bit wrong. Dr Beeching was appointed by Minister of Transport Ernest Marples to Rationalise the Rail Network and to remove rail services that were unprofitable or duplicate. Which is what this song is about the disappearance of many of this Country's branch lines. Steam Locomotives wer nothing to do with Beeching, their disappearance was part of a post war modernization program. In fact electrification of lines had started in some regions in the early 1900's. I am no fan of Dr Beeching but I think it unfair to 'hate' him for something that he had nothing at all to do with.
If you like A4 Silver Link you can find an old B&W film starring Will Hay here on youtube called 'oh Mr porter' in the early scenes of the film Will Hay is a wheel Tapper working along the wheels of Silver Link. You might find the film very funny.
Great video, do you mind if I borrow it for a presentation I am doing?
be my guest, and thank you
Absolute class.
many thanks Brasil!
The status of the stations. Miller's Dale Gone, Kirby Muxloe gone but line still present, Mow Cop & Scholar Green gone, Blandford Forum gone, Mortehoe gone, Midsomer Norton gone, Mumby Road gone, Chorlton Cum Hardy reopened as light rail, Chester Le Street spared, Littleton & Badsey gone, Openshaw spared, Long Stanton reopened as guided busway, Formby spared, Four Crosses gone, Dunstable Town gone, Dogdyke gone, Tumby Woodside gone, Trouble House Halt gone, Audlem gone, Ambergate spared, Chittening Platform gone, Cheslyn Hay gone, Selby and Goole Spared (but linking line gone), St Erth to St Ives spared due to politics (marginal seat!), Cockermouth gone, Armley Moor gone, Arram spared, Pye Hill and Somercotes gone, Windmill End gone...
+mrianmacc
captain cat would probably say: "oh my poor dead dears"
Loved listening to this one again. Brings back a lot of happy memories. Thank you!
St. Erth to St. Ives still working as a park & ride and crowded with tourists in summer
Dr beeching is probably the most hated figure in railways and rightfully so
Don't forget his pal, Ernest Marples, the transport minister who owned a road building company.
Very neat!
Good job! To think they closed all those lines to save a few bob, and what have we to show for it now, apart from billions being wasted on other interminable money pits... ?
very nice😊
HARVEY THE CRANE ENGINE
thank you
Formby is still open
Anyone remember putting pennies on the tracks?
Hi Mike, Yes on the St.Ives branch, still have some and a threepenny bit!
We used to put ha'pennies on, hoping innocently that people might mistake the results for pennies, and we could buy more sweets! 😁
@@michaelarnold417
ooh you scamps!
@@barleyarrish Looooong ago. But still a hopeless optimist! 😂
@@barleyarrish Coins back then, Bitcoins now, heh heh!
Midsomer!!!! Norton
Jon Boy
Sorry about that, probably the romantic idea of the sound of the name, simmering locomotives and the english summer over-rode my spelling...
Formby survived!
The Liverpool Exchange to Southport line was on the list for closures, though.
@@phwbooth Yes it was, along with Southport to Preston, which was closed
Mortehoe is pronounced Mort Ho, not Mortyhoe. Chester-le-Street is pronounded Chesserly Street, not Chester Le Street.
And that is all part of the beauty of English names,
I have a difficult one, but...Then I live in Cornwall and the pronounciation of a great many place names, is even got wrong by born and bred Cornish...
Thank you for watching and hopefully enjoying.
It's hardly a tribute to Beeching is it? More a damning criticism.
We must remember the untried criminal Marples when we talk of Beeching.
Tic
Its Flanders and Swann not Fanders and Swann you doughnutty
Stainer Cup
your the first in 5 years to notice and i thought i had got away with it... dratt!
Okay wheatrash, well drinking so much at this time of night I miss nothing except the toilet seat.
he does apologise for that in the intro! didnt you notice
Beeching was an awful persom, Woodam was much better.
***** If he was in the US, that would have been a catastrophe.