Monday 1 June 2015

In Fog 1: York's Railway History on Stage

This is the first in a series of posts about my role as part of York Theatre Royal's production In Fog and Falling Snow (26th June to 11th July). See links below to follow this series!

Something exciting is happening in York this Summer and I'm really glad to be part of it by singing in the choir. York Theatre Royal have a history of organising top quality productions with a large community cast, including the Mystery Plays (which I saw in 2012) and Blood & Chocolate, a promenade performance around the city centre in 2014 telling stories about how World War One affected York's chocolate makers.
The Signal Box Theatre under construction at the NRM


How did York become the centre of the rail industry that it is today? The answer rests on one man, as hated as he was loved, George Hudson, and his story will be told this summer by the people of York around the steam engines and carriages of the National Railway Museum in a new play, "In Fog and Falling Snow". The play will make use of a new temporary "Signal Box Theatre" (built around existing rail lines in the South Yard at the NRM and includes a genuine signal box where the stage manager will be keeping us in order...) 

So who was George Hudson? He was known as the Railway King in the early days of railways,when there were shares to be bought and sold and fortunes to be won. Hudson bought and amalgamated several rail companies & used his influence in Parliament to ensure that the East Coast Mainline went through York rather than Leeds. He later became Lord Mayor of York. But he has a chequered story of boom and bust, with many of his investments eventually found to be fraudulent in the Enron scandal of his day, which meant that he spent part of his later life in prison. He is, indirectly, the reason I'm a rail engineer: if you want to live in York & work in construction, your choice is either working on rail projects in York or commute to Leeds, and I've done both in my time...


For that reason, his role in York's rise to prominence has often been airbrushed from the popular accounts (often by his rivals). Hudson Street spent a century as only Railway Street until it was renamed in the 1970s, and the standard joke by Network Rail colleagues is that the best view of York is to be had inside the offices at Hudson House (the concrete building next to the new Network Rail office just inside the city walls) ... because when you're inside it you can't see Hudson House! The last laugh may be upon us however, as in six months time the engineering offices will become flats instead.

Many people don't realise just how important the rail industry continues to be to this city. Because the carriage works have closed down, so York no longer manufactures trains, it is assumed that it is only the station which has lasting importance being a junction between north/south and east/west routes, and the museum which celebrates the glory days when York was the centre of the rail network. It still is. York is home to the head offices of train companies Grand Central, Northern Rail and Virgin East Coast and hosts major offices for First TransPennine Express and freight companies like DB Schenker as well.

Network Rail's George Stephenson House in York is responsible for the operation and maintenance of the whole London North East (LNE) route which means the East Coast Mainline from London to Berwick upon Tweed, plus all railway tracks east of the Pennines from Lincolnshire to Scotland. In a word, massive. Most of the East Midlands route is managed from York also (London to Sheffield via Bedford and Nottingham, plus branch lines) with Derby as a secondary centre. 
Network Rail routes: York controls LNE and
East Midlands, which covers
nearly a quarter of England!

All the major engineering firms have rail-only offices in York serving not just maintenance needs but the redesign of the rail network to meet the needs of the future, from the North Doncaster Chord to the ETCS signalling system being designed in York. This will be a world first: applying high speed train in-cab signalling technology to a complex existing line, the East Coast Mainline, with hundreds of different types and speeds of train for commuters, long distance passengers and freight.

Another innovation is the "Rail Operating Centre" or ROC newly opened at York, which is one of just 12 centres replacing signalboxes up and down the country with a combined signalling and electrical control centre for the entire route. In case you missed it, that's the new shiny building between the tracks which most people seem to think is an office block (the inside's a bit more high tech and high security than that!)

In my next posts I'll be exploring the relationship between NRM and the Theatre Royal, my own railway stories and how a humble rail engineer came to be taking part in a production alongside professional actors like George Costigan.

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