Last Trains: Dr Beeching and the Death of Rural England

The publication of Dr Richard Beeching's report The Reshaping of British Railways in March 1963 sparked protests and resentments which continue to this day. Did the bankrupt steam railway symbolize everything that was wrong with a declining country? Did Beeching's judgements bring hardship and precipitate the end of rural ways of life? Tracing the transport revolution back to 1914, Charles Loft judiciously examines the political processes which led to the branch lines' closure.

Charles Loft was born in London at the height of the Beeching era and spent much of his youth exploring abandoned railway lines. He received his PhD from the University of London in 1999. He currently works as a policy adviser and still occasionally gets lost while looking for forgotten railways. He lives in London.