Beeching Axe
A number of the cuts to the Norfolk network predated the Beeching Axe by several years. In 1959 the Main Line of the Midland and Great Northern Joint Railway was closed, on economic grounds. Essential maintenance work was considered too much to be justified.
As car ownership increased, the need for rural routes was considered lessened, and the least profitable were screened for closure in order to save money. Beeching issued a report in 1962, recommending that a large number of stations and lines be closed.
In Norfolk, on the principal routes, such as the Great Eastern Main Line, a number of the intermediate stations at small rural towns and villages were closed, to speed up journey times. Smaller branch lines like the Waveney Valley Line were closed completely.
Many of the former trackbeds were tuned into pathways such as Marriots Way, which remain open to cyclists and pedestrians. Many of the former stations were converted for private use.
A few routes managed to survive the initial cuts, such as the line between Lowestoft and Great Yarmouth which survived until 1970. The Bittern Line was not proposed for closure, and stayed open. But King's Lynn-Hunstanton and King's Lynn-Dereham-Wymondham closed despite not being proposed for closure in the Report.
A second report by Beeching had proposed even more severe cuts to the East Anglia rail network, leaving only the Main Line into Norwich, but it was rejected by the government.
Read more about this topic: Railways In Norfolk, History
Famous quotes containing the word axe:
“If the axe is not sharp, it doesn’t matter how hard the wood is.”
—Chinese proverb.