Richard Beeching

DR RICHARD BEECHING d1985. British physicist and engineer who for a short but very notable time was chairman of British Railways. He became a household name in Britain in the early 1960s for his report ; The Reshaping of British Railways (commonly referred to as "The Beeching Report") which led to far-reaching changes in the railway network, popularly known as "the Beeching Axe". As a result of the report, just over 4,000 route miles were removed from the system on cost and efficiency grounds, leaving Britain with 13,721 miles of railway lines in 1966. A further 2,000 miles were lost by the end of the 1960s while other lines were reduced to freight use only. He died in Sussex aged 71 on March 23rd 1985