96 Products

Begun in the 1860s, the London Underground has a rich legacy of historic architecture and fixtures. Some are listed, others have been given heritage status by Transport for London. Illustrated in colour throughout, this absorbing book charts the design history of the Tube, and celebrates the gems that many commuters pass by without noticing. Here are Leslie Green’s turn-of-the-century oxblood-tiled stations, Charles Holden’s Art Deco masterpieces, and a plethora of clocks, tiles, lighting, ornamental metalwork and signs.

Playing a crucial role in building one of the world's best transport systems, London's bus, tram, rail and Underground workers have fought hard to improve working conditions over the years. This book studies workforce and management relations from the late 19th to the 21st century.

Before the creation of the West Midlands Passenger Transport Executive in 1969, the corporation bus companies of Birmingham, West Bromwich, Walsall and Wolverhampton all had distinctively liveried fleets, as did the famous independents in the region: Stratford Blue, Harper Brothers, Don Everall and Midland Red. This book reviews the vehicles employed by these operators through a collection of colour photographs, mostly of buses working their city routes during the 1960s.

Motor buses were introduced in Brighton in 1904 to compete with the new tram service, but complaints about the noise prompted Brighton, Hove and Preston United Omnibus Company to purchase a fleet of battery-powered electric buses in 1909. This illustrated history charts the development of public transport in the city and its environs, from the introduction of the tram system in 1901 to the 1990s when the buses went into private ownership.

Peter Saxton conducts a ‘whistle-stop tour of railway history’, from Stephenson’s Rocket and the first underground line to the Chinese high-speed magnetic levitation train. En route there is information on topics from engineering to railway poets, including descriptions of memorable rail incidents and introductions to such notable figures as George Bradshaw, Richard Beeching and Sir Nigel Gresley.

The report prepared by Richard Beeching in 1963 on the future of the railways was a turning point for the network, the swingeing cuts proposed now seen to have been powerfully influenced by the road-building lobby. Although a few routes escaped the axe, most were gone by the end of the decade. This nostalgic book explores every line that was closed as a result of the report, with brief histories and photographs of the routes while still operational.

Photographing the railways of the North East in the 1960s, Richard Gaunt strove to create more interesting scenes than the standard three-quarter 'wedge' train composition and many of the images in this portfolio display atmospheric and unusual views of platform, shed, siding and loco. Covering the Midland and West Coast Main Lines in Lancashire and Yorkshire and further north, the images are accompanied by the author's recollections of the period.

Prolific railway photographer Bill Reed made many trips around the Western Region of British Railways and this collection of over 150 colour photographs, taken between 1958 and 1967, covers the whole area from West Wales and Cornwall to London, with key locations such as Swindon, Bristol, Exeter and Newton Abbot well represented. Among a variety of locomotives pictured are Kings and Halls and a few examples of the new diesels.

From the earliest known map that shows a waggon-way in 1637, this atlas uses contemporary cartography, mostly from previously unpublished maps, along with illustrations of trackbeds, locomotives and rolling stock, to trace the technological development of railways in Britain. Beginning with primitive wooden rails used in mines and quarries, it describes progress up to the first modern, steam-driven railways in the early 19th century, and ends by surveying the transfer of the technology to other countries.

Walt Disney fell in love with trains as a boy, and featured them in his work for the rest of his life. With anecdotes about Walt’s job on his local line, and Mickey Mouse’s ‘birth’ on a train, this publication catalogues the locomotives in Disney movies, from Trolley Troubles, in 1927, through to 2014’s Planes: Fire and Rescue. Also featuring Walt’s own miniature railways, and the full-size Disney Railroad, the book includes colour photographs and previously unseen conceptual artwork.

By 1910, railway pioneers worldwide had laid over half a million miles of track, tunnelling through the Alps, crossing Andean peaks and linking Moscow with the Pacific coast. Talbot’s classic account of the romantic age of railway building celebrates the innovation, hardship and sheer determination of surveyors, engineers and workers in building the world’s great iron roads, including the American First Transcontinental Railroad, the never completed ‘Cape to Cairo’ Trans-African railway, and the Ffestiniog ‘toy’ railway in Wales.

When men from Great Western Railway’s audit division left to fight in the First World War, they began to correspond with staff back home in the Paddington office where their letters were compiled into monthly ‘newsletters’. Twelve of these newsletters are arranged chronologically in this touching collection, in which a group of colleagues bound together by work, yet scattered across France, Belgium, the Dardanelles, Greece, India and Egypt, pour out their thoughts and reflections about life on the front.

Famous for its record-breaking express service on the LNER in the 1920s and 1930s, then as a globe-trotting preserved locomotive after 1963, the Flying Scotsman is now a national icon. This history of the engine, from Nigel Gresley’s drawing board to the National Railway Museum in 2016, is illustrated with over 130 photographs and reproductions, from a rare shot of the newly constructed locomotive at the Doncaster shed in 1923, to a stunning picture of the train on an evening test run, 2016.

Despite the electrification of many of the main line routes in Sussex during the 1930s, there were still steam locomotives running across the region in the 1950s and 1960s, including Bulleid light pacifics working services beyond the county and smaller engines on freight and shunting duties. Charting the scene during the last years of steam, many of the photographs in this collection are in colour and additional illustrations include period tickets, labels and timetables.

The 1955 British Railways Modernization Plan called for the replacement of steam locomotion, and British Railways placed 'pilot scheme' orders for diesels with a number of British manufacturers. The lack of standardization caused logistical problems and some of the many different models built proved unreliable or unsuited. All the major first-generation diesel locomotives, produced by English Electric, Metropolitan-Vickers and others, are featured in this collection of mostly colour photographs.

The railways in Dorset evolved around four main routes, two running east–west and two running north–south. Including some images dating to the early 20th century, this collection of archive photographs explores the county's lines during the steam era, including the small branch lines and other interesting aspects of the region's railways, such as the Weymouth Quay Tramway where trains ran on public roads through the town.

The Southern Railway was formed in 1923, an amalgamation of three companies. This meticulously detailed study by the veteran railway historian Colin Maggs traces the history of the three main companies and smaller railways, such as the Isle of Wight Railways and the London, Chatham Dover Railway. It also describes and illustrates, with around 100 period photographs, the locomotives and rolling stock, and covers topics such as major accidents and the railways’ cross-Channel shipping enterprises.

Boasting the fastest journey time between London and Edinburgh became first a marketing priority and then a matter of prestige for the rival railway companies operating the east- and west-coast routes in the 1880s. The contest was then extended to Aberdeen in the 1890s with the completion of bridges across the Forth and the Tay. David Wragg's account of the period explores the fierce inter-company rivalries, the record attempts and the engineering triumphs and disasters that marked the contest.

The Severn Tunnel, opened in 1886, brought increased traffic to South Wales. Communications were further improved in the early 20th century with GWR's 'Badminton Line' providing a direct link to London. Telling the history of the line, including its upgrading for high-speed trains in the 1970s, this book explores the stations, junctions, signal boxes, tunnels and other features of the route as well as the duties of staff who have worked on the railway.

Services on South African railways were in the process of modernization during the 1980s when renowned railway photographer, Keith Pirt, made several visits. He was nevertheless able to capture dramatic colour images of steam working the passenger network across the country and steam locos doing heavy work in South Africa's coal, gold and platinum industries.

A mainstay of the Scottish railway scene since introduction in the early 1960s, the British Rail diesel-electric Class 37 locos were becoming a rarer sight by the 1990s. This book reviews operations, including the iconic Highland sleeper services, showing locos, often set against dramatic landscapes, in the various BR passenger and freight liveries of the era.

In 1962 the Scottish Region decided to speed up services between Glasgow and Aberdeen using steam traction. The surprising decision to employ steam was against the trend towards diesel and it prompted a massive upsurge of interest in the route. The action photographs in this album date from 1948 to 1966 and pay tribute to the BR steam era and, in particular, Sir Nigel Gresley’s magnificent Class A4 Pacifics as they ran their final race.

Carrying tourists to the south coast and the West, the line between Birmingham and Bristol saw lots of holiday traffic in the steam era as well as plenty of freight activity around large yards in the Bristol area. This pictorial survey gives a brief history of the line and presents a collection of archive photographs of the section between Cheltenham and Bristol from the late 19th century to the 1960s.

Across five continents, Julian Holland travelled on some of the world’s most remote and rugged railways, such as the Ferrocarril del Sur, climbing from Peru’s Pacific coast into the high Andes, but he also sought out less well-known railways kept alive by enthusiasts, tourists and heritage-minded governments. Here, he describes 50 journeys – under steam, diesel or electric power – along lines as varied as Le Petit Train Jaune in the French Pyrenees and ‘The Ghan’, crossing Australia from Adelaide to Darwin.

Thousands of miles of Britain's railways were closed during the 20th century, many following the infamous 'Beeching Report' in the 1960s and early 1970s. Since then, some of the old trackbeds have been converted to footpaths and cycleways – hidden byways through beautiful, tranquil countryside. Richly illustrated with maps and photographs, old and new, this book explores 50 of these routes, outlining their history and describing what they have to offer today's walkers, cyclists and railway enthusiasts.

‘The rigid regulations of the Continental Police, and the Passport custom, are the two greatest annoyances experienced by English travellers on the Continent.’ No intrepid Victorian would have ventured across the Channel without heeding the advice of Bradshaw’s guide. Packed with railway timetables, hotel recommendations, maps, period advertisements and practical information, this new, large-format version of the 1853 edition, as featured in the TV series Great Continental Railway Journeys, recreates an age when rail travel was an adventurous novelty.

Once described as ‘the Piranesi of the age of steam’, John Cooke Bourne (1814–1896) recorded the building of the railways and great feats of engineering such as deep cuttings, tunnels and viaducts in two books of lithographs: Drawings of the London & Brighton Railway (1839) and The History and Description of the Great Western Railway (1846). Along with essays on Bourne, this book reproduces more than 60 topographical prints, with commentaries, providing a view of England in an era of transformation.

As Keats observed in his ‘Ode on a Grecian Urn’, music and art have been intertwined since antiquity. Published to accompany a major exhibition at the San Diego Museum of Art, this beautiful volume explores the connection from ancient pottery to contemporary video art. Superbly illustrated with more than 250 colour images, the essays examine the representation of music in the arts of Europe, Asia, Africa and the Americas, collaborations between musicians and artists, and phenomena such as synaesthesia.

This collection of 130 colour images shows 71 different liveries and 37 classes of locomotive units, photographed in spectacular locations across Britain in the first decade after privatization in 1994.

The 121 maps reproduced in this volume tell the story of the railways in Britain in a unique and visual way, from proposals and plans produced by the early pioneers to specially commissioned maps showing recent re-openings and newly built lines. Including passenger route planners from the height of the steam age and Beeching's controversial network revisions of the 1960s, the book charts two centuries of profound change and provides insights into both railway and cartographic history.

Once seen on station platforms across the country, posters for the railway companies represented a highpoint of 1920s and 1930s commercial art. This collection, featuring posters and other publicity materials, illustrates how the 'golden age of steam' was also a golden age of graphic design. Among the destinations advertised by the London, Midland and Scottish Railway were Lytham St Annes, Morecambe Bay, the Lake District, Ireland and, in a glamorous painting of theatregoers by Fortunino Matania, Southport in wintertime.

Ben Ashworth presents his second volume of over 200 atmospheric photographs depicting the railways of Gloucestershire over the years 1959 to 1966. At the beginning of that period, steam was still dominant, branch lines were still operating and stations and halts were prolific; by 1966 diesel power had usurped the steam locomotive, many of the branch lines had closed and only a small number of stations remained in daily use.

Opened in 1907, the branch of the Piccadilly Line from Holborn to Aldwych was a little-used appendage that managed to survive until 1994. This illustrated history of the Aldwych branch explains why it was built at all and describes the alternative ways in which the Strand (later Aldwych) and Holborn stations and the track have been used, including their roles as art depository, offices and shelters during the Second World War and for experimental architectural purposes since 1994.

Despite its national importance, linking the cities of London, Birmingham, Manchester and Glasgow, the West Coast Main Line was constructed in piecemeal fashion as a number of separate local lines. This second volume of photographs tracing its history focuses on two of these early lines: the Lancaster and Preston Junction Railway and the Lancaster and Carlisle Railway, which has a spectacular route including the famous climb to Shap Summit. The archive images are accompanied by detailed captions.

From Brunel's Royal Albert Bridge across the Tamar to Aberdovey and Towyn on the Cambrian Coast Line, David Soggee's colour photographs show the stations and tracks of Western Region branch lines as they were in the 1950s and early 1960s, before diesel traction and the Beeching closures had made significant impact. The photographs are accompanied by detailed commentaries, packed with information on the lines and locomotives.