The story of the Queensway and Kingsway road tunnels, together known as the Mersey Road Tunnels, is a story of progress and growth as the area around them developed and changed. No tunnel of comparable diameter had been built before, and nothing matched its length or its complexity. Once completed, despite fierce opposition from the powerful and persuasive rail industry, this incredible feat of engineering was dubbed ‘the eighth wonder of the world’ in some corners. Work started on the tun...

The Sunday Times BestsellerA glorious insight into Britain over the last 150 years – its history, landscape and people – from the window of Britain’s many and magnificent railway journeys.Inspired by George Bradshaw, a 19th-century cartographer who mapped Britain’s railways as they sprung up around him, Charlie Bunce and Michael Portillo take a journey along nine classic British railway routes and surround themselves with the history, the charm and the people at the heart o...

A charming history of one of the long closed rural branch lines on the Great Western Railway. The Lambourn Valley was one of the most quintessentially English branch lines in the days of steam.The Lambourn Valley Railway was born as an independent little railway that ran from Newbury up Berkshire's scenic Lambourn Valley to Lambourn. On the way it passed through 9 rural stations and ran through beautiful countryside.In this book we learn when the line was built and why. The...

Fred Dibnah was a man born out of his time. His era should have been the 'magnificent age of British engineering' - the nineteenth century - and his heroes were the great industrial engineers of the period whose prolific innovations and dedicated work ethic inspired a national mood of optimism and captured the hearts of the British public.Fred Dibnah's Victorian Heroes tells the stories of some of these men - including George and Robert Stephenson, Isambard Kingdom Brunel ...

The Forest of Dean is one of the largest areas of mixed woodlands in the UK with broadleaves and conifers of several species, flora and fauna, streams and ponds all masquerading the industrial remains of the Forest’s heavy industry - iron mines, furnaces, scowles and disused mines. Today it's an area for leisure, bordered by the River Wye to the west and Severn to the east.This book gives an insight into the industrial history and heritage of the area through to the present day wit...

The landscape has had a huge impact on the history of Liverpool and Merseyside. The ice age glaciers carved out the Rivers Mersey and Dee; the Sefton coast provided a perfect place for the earliest humans to hunt and gather food; and the Pool and the Mersey, and England's position on the coast gave King John the perfect base from which to launch his Irish campaigns. This book explores the landscapes from these earliest times, and charts the changing city right through to t...

The nineteenth century was an era of scientific advance like no other in history. And no nation gained more from its forward momentum than Britain and her Empire. Railways were built, bridges constructed, rivers tamed and electricity harnessed, to the great benefit of all But progress was only achieved at high cost. Impatience for achievement too often resulted in catastrophe and disaster. In 1879, the Tay Bridge was the longest in the world and a wonder of its age. But on a stormy night i...

Join engineer, steeplejack and beloved storyteller Fred Dibnah, as he takes you on a personal tour through industrial Britain.Bringing to life landmark events from the eighteenth to the early twentieth century in his typically engaging and anecdotal style, Fred introduces the great inventors from the age of steam, describes the day-to-day operation of railways, mills, forges and factories, and paints a vivid picture of what life was like for the mill-hands, colliers and engineers w...

In 1963 Dr Beeching's infamous report signalled the end for over 15,000 miles of track, a third of Britain's stations, and for 70,000 jobs, as well as making irrevocable changes to the way of life of many consumers. Much misery was caused and Beeching's name was muddied, but in hindsight the report probably did more than any other single factor to preserve the nation's railway heritage. Without the Beeching cuts, much of the locomotives, stock, tracks, signals and signs wo...

The name 'Great Western Railway' immediately conjures up images of Stars, Castles and Kings, the legendary express passenger locomotives that were the envy of the world in their day. However, the Swindon empire also produced extensive fleets of all-purpose tank engines - everyday reliable workhorses and unsung heroes - which were standout classics in their own right. The most distinctive and immediately recognizable type in terms of shape, all but unique to the GWR, was the six-coupled pan...

The Flying Scotsman is probably the most famous railway locomotive in the world. It first caused a sensation for its beauty and its speed in 1923, and it soon became a national icon. The fastest and most comfortable way of travelling between London and Scotland, The Flying Scotsman only got faster and more luxurious as competition from other routes, airlines, and the motor car threatened. From 1928 it began running non-stop, an achievement that earned it yet more attention. This superbly i...

The story of the most iconic railway company of the great age of steam.The initials ‘GWR’ conjure an evocative picture of a Brunswick green locomotive hauling tea-and-cream-coloured coaches through a verdant West Country landscape. But the GWR was not just engines and trains.In this comprehensive history, Colin Maggs, one of the country’s foremost railway historians, tells of other, perhaps less well-known aspects of the company’s history. Its construction and expansion; th...