Competition, regulation and nationalization: The Prussian railway system in the nineteenth century

AbstractFrom the 1830s, the British landscape was transformed by the development of the steam-hauled railway system, which necessitated bridges, viaducts and tunnels. Of such structures, tunnel entrances feature little in serious studies of railway architecture. However, rich archival evidence exists relating to the designs of Isambard Kingdom Brunel for the tunnel portals on the Great Western Railway between London and Bristol, including numerous pencil and ink drawings in sketchbooks held by the Brunel Archive, University of Bristol, and watercolour elevations in the Network Rail Archive in York, as well as lithographs of the portals by John Cooke Bourne for his History and Description of the Great Western Railway (1846). Brunel's drawings, unique among nineteenth-century engineers, range from the classical style for Box and Middle Hill tunnels in Wiltshire, through the Gothic for Twerton in Somerset, to the Romanesque for Brislington on the edge of Bristol, his so-called ‘Tunnel No. 1’. In their variety and careful design, Brunel's portals represent an important part of Britain's railway and industrial architectural heritage.

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Expertise and policy-making: Main actors, debates and outcomes in the making of the Portuguese railway network (1850–90)

The Journal of Transport History ◽

10.1177/0022526620908585 ◽

2020 ◽

pp. 002252662090858

Author(s):

Hugo S Pereira

Keyword(s):

Nineteenth Century ◽

Policy Making ◽

Decisive Role ◽

Transportation Systems ◽

Railway Network ◽

Parliamentary Debates ◽

Army Officers ◽

Railway System ◽

Technical Issues

In the second half of the nineteenth century, Portugal built the main branches of its railway system. In this paper, I will use technical and military reports, parliamentary debates and sundry bibliography to analyse the influence of the different stakeholders. I investigated the expectations, priorities and agendas of engineers, army officers, policymakers and lobbyists in the design of the Portuguese railway network. I argue that historiography about Portuguese railways usually considers the rationale behind their discussion as entirely technological and focuses mainly on their outputs, taking railways for granted, or black-boxed. However, the planification of large transportation systems depends on the sociotechnical context and on hierarchies of power of their time. I will show that experts (mostly engineers) played a decisive role in the planning of the network, but a large part of its design was due to non-technical issues, including political machinations, budgetary constraints and corporative lobbying.

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The railway as a catalyst of change in nineteenth century provincial Spain

SIGLO DIECINUEVE (Literatura hispánica) ◽

10.37677/sigloxix.v0i22.62 ◽

2016 ◽

pp. 161-178

Author(s):

Jacqueline A. Jordán ◽

Marta Manrique Gómez

Keyword(s):

Nineteenth Century ◽

Short Story ◽

Late Nineteenth Century ◽

The Novel ◽

Railway System ◽

Women And Children ◽

Late Nineteenth

This article analyzes the significance of the emergence of the railway system in the Spain of the late nineteenth century through the study of the short story ¡Adiós, Cordera! by Alas Clarín and the novel El tren directo by ortega y Munilla. Both authors represent the arrival of the train as a distorting element of the Spanish countryside which ends up destroying the lives of the main characters in both works and, in particular, the weakest, women and children.

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The Effect of Geography and Institutions on Economic Development: The Case of Lodz

Journal of Interdisciplinary History ◽

10.1162/jinh_a_01198 ◽

2018 ◽

Vol 48 (4) ◽

pp. 523-538 ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

Joanna Dzionek-Kozlowska ◽

Kamil Kowalski ◽

Rafal Matera

Keyword(s):

Nineteenth Century ◽

Economic Development ◽

Environmental Factors ◽

World War I ◽

Institutional Factors ◽

Sufficient Condition ◽

Cotton Production ◽

World War ◽

Railway System

Economic development in the Polish city of Lodz was a function of both geography and institutions. Neither geographical nor institutional factors, if taken separately, was a sufficient condition for long-term development. Although the economic achievements of Lodz depended on environmental factors throughout the entire period before World War I, dynamic progress there had to await the establishment of a beneficial institutional background—a change from wool to cotton production, the abolition of a custom’s border, and the construction of a railway system—in the nineteenth century.

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The naturalisation of nineteenth-century German Railways as depicted in visual discourse

The Journal of Transport History ◽

10.1177/00225266211031177 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 002252662110311

Author(s):

Zef Segal

Keyword(s):

Nineteenth Century ◽

Visual Images ◽

Natural Landscape ◽

Local Elites ◽

Visual Discourse ◽

Travel Guide ◽

Pastoral Landscapes ◽

Railway System ◽

Train System ◽

Rapid Transformation

Despite the dramatic effect of the railway age on the natural surroundings, it was not seen necessarily as destructive to nature. Railways were both the epitome of progress as well as integral features in pastoral landscapes. This seemingly paradoxical perception of railways is partially explained by historicising the “naturalisation” of the German train system. This article describes the rapid transformation of the German train from a symbol of dynamic industrialisation to an integral part of the landscape. Visual images, such as lithographs and postcards, were the catalysts in this process. Railway companies, local elites and travel guide publishers promoted the process of “naturalisation” for economic reasons, but the iconography was a result of visual discourse in nineteenth-century German culture. This paper shows that unlike American, British and French depictions of railways, German artists portrayed a railway system, which rather than conquering nature, was blending peacefully into an existing natural landscape.

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