Rail Infrastructure
Rail Infrastructure
A brief look at the organisation of British Railways, nationalisation, structure, privatisation and TOPS system classification of rolling stock.




Photo: Signal box on the Nene Valley Railway © LSA 2009.
| EXIT | Rail Infrastructure | TOPS |

British Railways

Circa 1921, the four main railway companies were:

  • Southern Railway (SR)
  • Great Western Railway (GWR)
  • London and North Eastern Railway (LNER)
  • London, Midland and Scottish Railway (LMS)
On 1st January 1948 British Railways came into existence and took responsibility for operating the country's railway system.

In 1965 British Railways became British Rail with a new corporate image:

British Rail
The double arrow logo was introduced across the whole network.
In 1966 Inter-City became the brand for the main-line express trains.
Freight services were named Railfreight.
   
On 1st April 1994 British Rail was privatised.

Network Rail
On 3rd October, 2002, Network Rail completed the acquisition of Railtrack plc.
   
TOPS

Total Operations Processing System - see page for Rail Express Systems (RES).

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