Routledge Revivals: The Atlas of British Railway History (1985) Routledge Revivals Series

First published in 1985, this Atlas uses over 50 specially drawn maps to trace the rise and fall of the railways? fortunes, and is supported by an interesting and authoritative text. Financial and operating statistics are clearly presented in diagrammatic form and provide a wealth of information rarely available to the student of railway history. Freeman and Aldcroft provide the basis for a new understanding of the way in which the railways transformed Britain by the scale of their engineering works, by shrinking national space and reorganising the layouts of urban areas. Maps show the evolution of early wagon routes into the first railway routes, the frenetic activity of the ?Railway Mania? years, and the consolidation of these lines into a national network. This exciting presentation of railway development will interest the enthusiast as well as the more general student of British transport history.

Introduction; PART ONE 1. Precursors 2. Birth 3. Pioneers 1: Stockton and Darlington 4. Pioneers 2: Liverpool and Manchester 5. A Network Created 6. Railway Mania 7. The Railway System by 1850 8. The Broad Gauge 9. Social Benefits 10. Railways in the Landscape PART TWO 11. The Network Matures: 1850-1875 12. The Growth of Traffic 13. The Locomotive Stable 14. Network Intensification: 1875-1914 15. The Race to the North 16. Railways and Towns 17. Railway Pricing 18. Traffic Density: 1901 19. Edwardian Zenith PART THREE 20. World War One 21. The Railways in 1921 22. The Grouping: 1923 23. Steam Power at its Zenith 24. A New Age in Passenger Services 25. Southern Electric 26. Road Competition: The Railway Response 27. Railway Air Services 28. The Railways in 1938 PART FOUR 29. World War Two 30. The Big Four in Twilight 31. Nationalisation 32. Modernisation 33. Air and Road Competition 34. The Beeching Era 35. Into a New Age… Or Lingering Decline? 36. Now They Are Closed… Now They Are Open; Acknowledgements