Key Books

Class 66: 5/6/9 In the late 1990s, English, Welsh & Scottish Railway (EWS) was having great success with its Class 66s, and Freightliner, which...

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 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 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...

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...

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...

Japan’s Railways: Hokkaido to Chubu Japan’s first railway opened between Tokyo and Yokohama in 1872. Its railways were nationalised in the early 19...

Japan’s Railways: Kinki to Kyushu At the start of the Menji Era, Japan emerged from its years of self-imposed isolation and quickly modernised. Par...

Rail Freight: Yorkshire and North East England In the early 1980s, coal was the lifeblood of many rail lines in Yorkshire and the North East, with...

The Modern Railway 2020 hardback provides an in-depth examination of: * Policy and finance * Infrastructure maintenance and renewal * Train oper...

Railways of Southern California Passing through some of the most picturesque scenery in the world, several main routes traverse Southern California...

Lines of the West Highlands The lines to the West Highlands start their journey in the heart of Central Scotland and were built to link up with por...

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...

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...

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...

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

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

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...

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

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...

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 37s, vol 2 The Class 37s have been in service for six decades and can still be seen in a variety of places. Most notable for the Class is the...

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