Great Western Coffee Shop

Is it just me, or do others too see similarities between the Network Rails maps for next week and the maps we see in old reports such as "Beeching" and "Serpell"?

(http://www.wellho.net/pix/newbeech.jpg)

(http://www.wellho.net/pix/newgenrail.jpg)

(http://www.wellho.net/pix/serpell_c3.jpg)

Isn’t it just that the busier routes tend to have the most modern signalling and are therefore easier to operate with fewer staff?

Or putting it another way - has the investment been on those routes, with the other routes being starved of parallel investment and now behind the times and hard to sustain.

The key strategic routes have not changed much over the decades, and yes investment does have a hierarchy based on key routes.

For the industrial action contingency planning point of view the primary and key routes will be the ones with centralised signalling centres anything that relies on older manual boxes or even some older Power Signal Boxes are difficult to staff

Can you think of any reason why the answer to the question "which are the key routes to keep open, including for goods traffic, if most of the network has to be closed down for a few days?" would be different to the answer to the question "which are the key routes to keep open, including for goods traffic, if most of the network has to be closed down permanently? The concentration of signalling on those main routes, so that fewer staff are needed, just makes the second question worth asking now (TSSA members permitting).

Yes I do feel slight unease.
I doubt that we will see large scale complete closures, but I DO see the beginnings of a two tier railway.
"Core routes" that must be kept open if at all possible.
And "Secondary routes" that are a lower priority, and can be closed first not just in strikes, but then in bad weather, or in a fuel shortage, or perhaps closed at the less busy times of year.