Books

Classic American Sedans of the 1950s: The Four-Doors In the new ‘baby boomer’ era of postwar North America, newly prosperous young families in the ...

Class 56s and 58s Designed specifically for heavy freight operations in the UK, British Rail’s Class 56 was introduced in 1976–84. The first 30 of ...

Class 57s The Class 57 diesel locomotive was an outgrowth of the tremendously successful and iconic Class 47. Rebuilt from redundant Class 47s by B...

Heritage DMUs: The Final Years At the beginning of the privatisation era of Britain’s railways, there was a pause in new rolling stock deliveries. ...

Class 31s Perhaps overshadowed by more ‘exotic’ locomotives, the Class 31s played a significant part in British Railways’ Modernisation Plan. Inten...

Electrostar: Capital Commuter At the turn of the millennium, a large percentage of the passenger services around London and the south-east were ope...

Class 68s In 2009, Direct Rail Services (DRS) ordered a small fleet of locos designed to remain in service until at least 2036 to futureproof its c...

British Rail Shunters: The Final Years By the beginning of the 1990s, the variety that once characterised British Rail’s (BR) shunter fleet had all...

Alexander Dennis Buses Three of the best-known names in the history of British bus building, Alexander, Dennis and Plaxton, have survived the uncer...

Class 73s Built in the 1960s, the Class 73s were primarily used on the Southern Region, owing to their ability to operate from either a diesel engi...

British Rail Shunters: From Corporate Blue to Sectorisation The role of British Rail’s (BR) diesel shunters was increasingly threatened by the la...

Class 33s In 1960, the Birmingham Railway Carriage and Wagon Company built a class of 98 locomotives, later to be designated Class 33s. They were c...

British Sports Cars Britain has been responsible for some of the greatest sports cars ever built – the ‘Blower’ Bentleys of the 1920s, diminutive M...

Buses and Coaches 1945–70: From Contemporary Adverts From 1945 to 1970, trade press advertisements for buses and coaches changed considerably, as t...

Class 159s: 30 Years’ Service By the late 1980s, the Class 50 and Class 47 locomotives working Network SouthEast’s West of England line from London...

Class 47s: Jack Of All Trades In 1962, construction of the first Class 47 began – the first of many. These ubiquitous locomotives were very popular...

Brush Type 4 to Class 47s – The First 20 Years It is 60 years since the first Class 47, No D1500, entered service with British Railways (BR). For m...

Bradford Trolleybuses: The Later Years and Closure After every rise, there comes a fall, and for Bradford’s trolleybuses their demise began soon a...

East Coast Main Line Locomotive Haulage The East Coast Main Line (ECML) runs from London King’s Cross to Edinburgh Waverley, with branches to Leeds...

Bradford Trolleybuses: The Early Years and Jubilee Celebrations Bradford trolleybuses were the first and the last of their kind in the UK – introdu...

Class 47s: Inverness to Newquay 1986–87 In the mid-1980s, the winds of change were blowing through British Rail and often not for the good; the pac...

Class 50s During the mid-1960s, British Rail (BR) was looking to introduce a high-powered diesel locomotive to improve services on the West Coast M...

Class 66: 3/4/7/8 In the late 1990s, English, Welsh and Scottish Railway (EWS) had led the way with its Class 66s. As other operators followed suit...

Class 66/0 In the late 1990s, most of the current locomotives in use on the national network were becoming very tired and evermore unreliable. It w...