The last days of the Great Central

Great Central in the 1960s from Morrie Greenberg on Vimeo.

This is another of those irresistible (to me at least) videos combining vintage railway film with a contemporary soundtrack. This one shows the very last days of the Great Central, accompanied by commercial and BBC radio and the odd television theme.

The whole of the line is covered, which means - at the end that interests me - you get footage of Rugby Central, Lutterworth and Leicester Central. And then it is on to the famously decrepit Nottingham Arkwright Street - the Great Central's Victoria Station had already closed by then.

One amusing aspect is seeing the stations between Leicester and Loughbrough closed and decaying. They have since been restored and reopened by the modern Great Central and now exist in a state of pristine nostalgia which may not reflect how they ever looked in their working life.

I shall leave you with two thoughts...

If the Great Central had remained opened it could have become the modern HS2 with much less disruption.

And the line north of Nottingham (not shown here) was built by my hero the railway contractor and Liberal MP for Harborough J.W. Logan.