Talk:North British Railway

Border Counties Railway
Shouldn't the Border Counties Railway be added to the list of component companies? It was absorbed into the NBR in 1860. Is the list ordered in any way? Clearly not alphabetical - chronological, perhaps? MegaPedant (talk) 16:57, 24 August 2009 (UTC)

Lord Tweeddale
I have removed the statement re the crisis of 1866 that "Lord William Hay joined the board and soon became chairman." A quick skim through Thomas shows that the immediate replacement for Hodgson was Kippendavie; he was followed by Sir James Falshaw, who was still chairman in 1882.Rjccumbria (talk) 21:49, 18 April 2014 (UTC)

Note on Sources
Thomas (the David & Charles railway history) is not too interested in NB-Caledonian relations, and has to be supplemented by old newspaper reports. At first sight, Charles McKean's "Battle for the North" (Granta, London, 2007) which claims to lift the lid on 'The Tay and Forth Bridges and the 19th-Century Railway Wars' looks as though it should do everything on this that Thomas fails to do. The publisher's blurb on the back cover claims it to be "Meticulously researched and vividly told". On the first point, however meticulous the research the final product seems to have more than its fair share of errors on easily checkable matters of fact; to give some examples from McKean's Chapter 3 In short, please don't edit on the basis of McKean's book (at least not without a sanity check)
 * an extraordinary meeting of NB shareholders is said to have been held in Dundee - the refererence given is the Scotsman of 15 Nov 1869 ; both the Glasgow Herald (effectively the paper of record for Scottish railway company affairs) and the Dundee Courier (which would notice anything significant going on in Dundee) report the meeting as having been held in the usual location (Queen Street Hall) in Edinburgh
 * Referring to the abortive amalgamation proposal McKean p 99 says 'when the Amalgamation Bill was laid before the House of Commons' giving as his reference on this "Thomas p 158" Thomas p 158 (I believe I have the same edition) says nothing to that effect and careful reading of Thomas pp160-1 shows his tale to be that the process never got so far as agreeing a draft Bill and submitting it for Parliamentary approval. Contemporary reports of shareholders' meetings etc in the Glasgow Herald tell more of the tale and bear out Thomas' account.
 * McKean p 97 says " When, despite the non-agression pact, the Caledonian decided to oppose the " (Tay) "bridge in June 1871" giving no reference. Hansard (HC Deb 10 August 1870 vol 203 c1792) gives a list of bills passed in the 1869-70 session of Parliament, including "cxxxv. An Act to authorise the North British Railway Company to make railways and a bridge across the Tay near Dundee, to connect their system with the railways of the Caledonian Railway Company east and west of Dundee; and for other purposes." The Dundee Courier & Glasgow Herald between 18-24 March 1870 give accounts of the Committee stages of the Bill - the Courier of 22 March 1870 reports the main speech of counsel for the Caledonian, who stressed that an agreement of 1865 between the Caley and the NB precluded the Caley opposing the bridge, although he allowed himself a few sharp remarks on the way it was financed.
 * 'Vividly told' is certainly true, but might perhaps be taken as a POV/'Channel 4 documentary' warning. McKean tells us (p. 97) 'Railway historians tend to regard this suggestion (of amalgamation) as somehow unworthy and ignoble' (reference given is Thomas p. 138)... concluding his paragraph 'It was entirely understandable for Kippendavie to explore whether the North British and the Caledonian might merge' which the unwary might take to be a fresh insight overturning previous thinking.  Thomas p 138 covers the election of Kippendavie as chairman; p 159-60 give Kippendavie's reasons for urging amalgamation, followed by Thomas' comment "It all made good sound sense" ....Rjccumbria (talk) 18:03, 23 April 2014 (UTC)

Network development
I think the NBR deserves some more detail on the development of the network. If this is added to this article, the sheer volume of words can get out of hand, and I think the way forward is a summary here directing the reader to specific articles elsewhere. This is particularly relevant due to the NBR policy of allowing local promoters to build a railway and then taking it over.

By the way, all those red alerts saying "Missing title" make me nervous. Afterbrunel (talk) 12:30, 10 August 2015 (UTC)
 * Those "Missing title" should be fixed. Consider the first one, in ref. North British Railway, this says:
 * The name of the newspaper and its cover date are both good - but there's nothing here to say where in the newspaper. There should be either the page number or the title of the article, or for preference both. Unfortunately, I don't have any old issues of this newspaper that I can consult. The accessdate parameter is also meaningless for offline sources, since they do not change with time. -- Red rose64 (talk) 14:32, 10 August 2015 (UTC)
 * Glasgow Herald is available online via British Newspaper Archive (which hopefully does not change with time, but ...); in the period in question it never ran to more than 8 pages, and had article headings of startling unoriginality; "North British Railway" being the heading of choice for articles on the North British Railway etc. Hence if you can access Glasgow Herald online, searching for 'North British Railway' for the specified paper of the specified cover date should get you there.  Functionally, therefore, the issue only really arises if you only have access to old paper copies, microfiches.  Presentationally, though, you are right; I apologise for the sub-standard presentation and have attempted to address it.Rjccumbria (talk) 19:05, 10 August 2015 (UTC)
 * Glasgow Herald is available online via British Newspaper Archive (which hopefully does not change with time, but ...); in the period in question it never ran to more than 8 pages, and had article headings of startling unoriginality; "North British Railway" being the heading of choice for articles on the North British Railway etc. Hence if you can access Glasgow Herald online, searching for 'North British Railway' for the specified paper of the specified cover date should get you there.  Functionally, therefore, the issue only really arises if you only have access to old paper copies, microfiches.  Presentationally, though, you are right; I apologise for the sub-standard presentation and have attempted to address it.Rjccumbria (talk) 19:05, 10 August 2015 (UTC)


 * No apology needed; the article is better than many, and your edit now makes it better than before. Afterbrunel (talk) 20:40, 18 August 2015 (UTC)

The clock
I'm sorry about this but folksy sentimental tales always make the alarm bells ring.

The article says

Since the building opened, the clock on the hotel has run three minutes ahead of real time to encourage tardy travellers to get to the station on time.

And the reference is to the Hotel's website. Can anyone actually find this referred to there? I can't, but websites are notoriously difficult to be sure you have seen everything. Afterbrunel (talk) 20:37, 18 August 2015 (UTC)

Accidents and incidents section
Should the "Accidents and incidents" not include the Tay Bridge disaster? While it is mentioned elsewhere in the article, as one of the most well-known railway disasters of the 19th century, and one which had a major impact on the NBR, I would think it would be useful to at least mention it here. Also I wonder if the Elliot Junction rail accident should be recorded in this section as well as well. Again it was a major accident and although it took place on the Dundee and Arbroath Railway (which was a joint North British-Caledonian line at this time) one of the trains involved was a North British train from Edinburgh to Aberdeen. I would welcome other editors thoughts on this. Dunarc (talk) 19:48, 30 December 2022 (UTC)
 * The first is covered at North British Railway, we don't need it twice. -- Red rose64 &#x1F98C; (talk) 22:33, 30 December 2022 (UTC)