Backtrack

In 1976 a new class of 3,250hp Co-Co diesel locomotives was introduced to meet British Rail’s need for heavy freight motive power – the Class 56. Due to a lack of home manufacturing capacity the first 30 were built in Romania of all places, but these

Unlike many other rural counties in England and Wales, the Welsh Unitary Authority of Gwynedd is fortunate to have retained a good number of railway stations. Most important by far is Bangor, the only station in Gwynedd on the North Wales Coast line,

Photographs from the author’s collection As long ago as 1836 railway pioneers set out to construct a railway line runnning north east from London to the county town of East Suffolk. Over the next 50 years Ipswich became the operational centre for a s

Tank engines with the 4-6-2 wheel arrangement have always been something of a rarity on the railways of Britain. Exactly why is something of an enigma, as the wheel arrangement would seem to be ideal for medium-distance express passenger workings of

The London Midland & Scottish Railway’s three-cylinder 5XP ‘Jubilee’ 4-6-0 middle-of-the-range express locomotives have a firm following, not least for their pleasing style and a host of stirring names, the first marking the Silver Jubilee of King Ge

In 1915 one British locomotive Chief Mechanical Engineer was faced with a particular problem and so he tried to make a success of F. H. Trevithick’s Phase D heat exchanger version by adding a waste gas heater to a simple exhauststeam heat exchanger.

After one year in my first management role as Training Co-ordinator with the British Railways Board Headquarters, London Midland Region, I was approached to become involved in two significant projects: LMST (London Midland Service Training) programme

The London & North Eastern Railway inherited a considerable stock of locomotives with the 4-4-0 wheel arrangement from all its constituent companies: 920 in total from no fewer than 49 classes at the grouping in 1923. Time and necessity inevitably th

Photographs from the author’s collection unless otherwise specified. “Scarcely any railway in England equals the Manchester and Leeds, in the vast number and agreeable variety of views possessed by nearly every locality almost throughout its entire e

The crossing of the English Channel was for years in the hands of the railway companies on both sides, with some prestigious vessels being built for this important service. In November 1958 a new ship for British Railways was launched at the Clyde ya