Mobico Group, formerly National Express Group, is a British multinational public transport company with headquarters in Birmingham, England. Domestically it currently operates bus and coach services under brands including National Express. The company also operates transport services including trains abroad: in the Republic of Ireland, United States, Canada, Spain, Portugal, Malta, Germany, Bahrain, Morocco, Qatar, United Arab Emirates and South Korea, and long-distance coach services across Europe. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the FTSE 250 Index.
Southern is the brand name used by the Govia Thameslink Railway (GTR) train operating company on the Southern routes of the Thameslink, Southern and Great Northern franchise in England. It is a subsidiary of Govia, a joint venture between transport groups Go-Ahead and Keolis, and has operated the South Central franchise since August 2001 and the Gatwick Express service since June 2008. When the passenger rail franchise was subsumed into GTR, Southern was split from Gatwick Express and the two became separate brands, alongside the Thameslink and Great Northern brands.
Merseyrail is a commuter rail network which serves Merseyside and adjacent areas of Cheshire and Lancashire in the North West of England. Merseyrail serves 69 stations, 67 of which it manages, across two lines – the Northern line and the Wirral line. The network uses 750 V DC third rail electrified lines having 75.0 miles (120.7 km) of routes, of which 6.5 miles (10.5 km) are underground. Since January 2023, Merseyrail commenced replacing its train fleet, withdrawing the Class 507 and 508 trains and introducing 53 new Class 777 trains. The network carried 28.3 million passengers in the 2023/2024 statistical period.
The Railways Act 1993 was introduced by John Major's Conservative government and passed on 5 November 1993. It provided for the restructuring of the British Railways Board (BRB), the public corporation that owned and operated the national railway system.
The British Rail Class 09 is a class of 0-6-0 diesel locomotive designed primarily for shunting and short-distance freight trips along branch lines.
The privatisation of British Rail was the process by which ownership and operation of the railways of Great Britain passed from government control into private hands. Begun in 1994, the process was largely completed by 1997. The deregulation of the industry was in part motivated by the enactment of EU Directive 91/440 in 1991, which aimed to create a more efficient railway network by creating greater competition.
In the railway system of Great Britain, a train operating company (TOC) is a railway undertaking operating passenger trains under the collective National Rail brand. TOCs have existed since the privatisation of the network under the Railways Act 1993.
The Go-Ahead Group Limited is a multi-national transport group based in Newcastle upon Tyne, England. While the majority of its operations are within Great Britain, it also operates services in Ireland, Australia, Singapore, and Norway. Go-Ahead was formerly listed on the London Stock Exchange prior to being purchased by Kinetic Group and Globalvia by 2022.
Connex Melbourne was a train operator in Melbourne, Australia. Formed in July 1998 as Hillside Trains, a business unit of the Public Transport Corporation, it was privatised in August 1999 becoming a subsidiary of Connex.
The British RailClass 411 (4CEP) electric multiple units were built at Eastleigh works from 1956–63 for the newly electrified main lines in Kent. These units, which used the British Railways Mark 1 bodyshell, were based on the earlier Southern Railway 4 COR design, built in 1937. Variants of the class 411 design included the class 410 and class 412 4 BEP units, which contained a buffet car in place of a standard trailer. They were later used on services in Sussex and Hampshire; following the privatisation of British Rail in 1995, the units were used by the Connex South Central, Connex South Eastern and South West Trains franchises. They were replaced by Juniper, Desiro, and Electrostar units. The fleet's lifespan was 49 years. These units are the longest-lived BR Mark 1 EMUs.
Gandy dancer is a slang term used for early railroad workers in the United States, more formally referred to as section hands, who laid and maintained railroad tracks in the years before the work was done by machines. The British equivalents of the term gandy dancer are navvy, originally builders of canals, or inland navigations, for builders of railway lines, and platelayer for workers employed to inspect and maintain the track. In the Southwestern United States and Mexico, Mexican and Mexican-American track workers were colloquially traqueros.
MTR Corporation Limited is a majority government-owned public transport operator and property developer in Hong Kong which operates the Mass Transit Railway, the most popular public transport network in Hong Kong. It is listed on the Hong Kong Exchange and is a component of the Hang Seng Index. The MTR additionally invests in railways across different parts of the world, including franchised contracts to operate rapid transit systems in London, Stockholm, Beijing, Hangzhou, Macao, Shenzhen, Sydney, and a suburban rail system in Melbourne.
The British Rail Class 456 was an electric multiple unit passenger train introduced by Network SouthEast on inner-suburban services in South London to replace the elderly Class 416 2EPB units. Twenty-four two-car units were built by British Rail Engineering Limited's York Carriage Works in 1990 and 1991.
Eden Park railway station serves Eden Park in the London Borough of Bromley in south east London, in Travelcard Zone 5. It is therefore possible to use an Oyster card at the station. It is 12 miles 34 chains (20.0 km) down the line from London Charing Cross. The station and all trains serving it is operated by Southeastern on the Hayes line. The trains are electric, powered by a third rail.
Norwich railway station is the northern terminus of the Great Eastern Main Line in the East of England, serving the cathedral city of Norwich, Norfolk. It is 114 miles 77 chains (185.0 km) down the main line from London Liverpool Street, the western terminus.
A motive power depot (MPD) or locomotive depot, or traction maintenance depot (TMD), is where locomotives are usually housed, repaired and maintained. They were originally known as "running sheds", "engine sheds" or just "sheds". Facilities are provided for refuelling and the replenishing of water, lubricating oil and grease and, for steam engines, the disposal of ash. There are often workshops for day-to-day repairs and maintenance, but locomotive building and major overhauls are usually carried out at locomotive works.
Brandon railway station is on the Breckland Line in the East of England, serving the town of Brandon, Suffolk, although the station is actually situated across the county boundary in Norfolk. The line runs between Cambridge in the west and Norwich in the east.
Immingham engine shed, also known as Immingham depot, or more recently as Immingham TMD and always locally as Loco is a railway maintenance depot located on the Immingham Dock estate, in North East Lincolnshire, England. The depot code is IM.
Passenger rail franchising in Great Britain is the system of contracting the operation of the passenger services on the railways of Great Britain to private companies, which has been in effect since 1996 and was greatly altered in 2020, with rail franchising being effectively abolished in May 2021. In 2024 rail franchising was formally abolished, with rail contracts set to enter government control at the expiration of their contracts from 2025 onwards.
Robert "Rob" Dawber was a British railwayman turned writer whose script for the film The Navigators was commissioned by director Ken Loach and shot in Sheffield, where Dawber lived. He was a long-standing member of the Trotskyist group the Alliance for Workers' Liberty.
