The following is a list of constituents of British Railways.

British Railways British Railways (BR), which from 1965 traded as British Rail, was a state-owned company that operated most of the overground rail transport in Great Britain from 1948 to 1997. It was formed from the nationalisation of the Big Four British ...

(BR) was formed by

nationalisation Nationalization (nationalisation in British English) is the process of transforming privately-owned assets into public assets by bringing them under the public ownership of a national government or state. Nationalization usually refers to p ...

on 1 January 1948 in accordance with the

Transport Act 1947 The Transport Act 1947 (10 & 11 Geo. 6 c. 49) was an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Under the terms of the Act, the railway network, long-distance road haulage and various other types of transport were nationalised and came under ...

. It had four major constituents, but there were a number of joint lines between these, and additionally some

light railways ''Light Railways'' is a magazine produced by the Light Railway Research Society of Australia (LRRSA). The subtitle is "Australia's Magazine of Industrial and Narrow Gauge Railways". History The LRRSA started in the 1961 to foster interest in ...

were taken into the fold. Even then, some light railways were not nationalised.

Major constituents

The major constituents (the " Big Four") were: *

Great Western Railway The Great Western Railway (GWR) was a British railway company that linked London with the southwest, west and West Midlands of England and most of Wales. It was founded in 1833, received its enabling Act of Parliament on 31 August 1835 and ran ...

(GWR) *

London Midland and Scottish Railway The London, Midland and Scottish Railway (LMSIt has been argued that the initials LMSR should be used to be consistent with LNER, GWR and SR. The London, Midland and Scottish Railway's corporate image used LMS, and this is what is generally ...

(LMS) *

London and North Eastern Railway The London and North Eastern Railway (LNER) was the second largest (after LMS) of the " Big Four" railway companies created by the Railways Act 1921 in Britain. It operated from 1 January 1923 until nationalisation on 1 January 1948. At th ...

(LNER) * Southern Railway (SR)

Joint railways

Joint railways between the four major constituents (and others) were: * Axholme Joint Railway Committee ( LMS, LNER) *

Cheshire Lines Committee The Cheshire Lines Committee (CLC) was formed in the 1860s and became the second-largest joint railway in Great Britain. The committee, which was often styled the Cheshire Lines Railway, operated of track in the then counties of Lancashire a ...

( LNER, LMS) * Dumbarton and Balloch Joint Railway ( LMS, LNER) * Dundee and Arbroath Joint Railway ( LMS, LNER) * Forth Bridge Railway Company ( LNER, LMS) *

Grangemouth Branch Railway The Grangemouth branch railways served Grangemouth docks on the Firth of Forth, Scotland, connecting the docks to the main line railway network. The first line was opened in 1860. The docks and the branch line developed considerably, and a second ...

(LMS, LNER) * Great Central and Midland Joint Committee ( LMS, LNER) * Great Central and North Staffordshire Joint Committee ( LMS, LNER) * Great Central and North Western Railways Joint Committee ( LMS, LNER) * Great Central, Hull and Barnsley and Midland Committee ( LNER, LMS) * Great Northern and London and North Western Joint Committee ( LMS, LNER) * Great Western and Great Central Railways Joint Committee ( GWR, LNER) * Great Western and Great Central (Banbury Junction Railway) Joint Committee ( GWR, LNER) * Halifax and Ovenden Joint Committee (LMS, LNER) * Halifax High Level Joint Committee (LMS, LNER) * London, Midland and Scottish and Great Western Railways Joint Committee ( GWR, LMS) * Manchester, South Junction and Altrincham Railway Company ( LMS, LNER) * Midland and North Eastern Railway Companies Committee ( LMS, LNER) * Mid-Nottinghamshire Joint Railway Committee ( LMS, LNER) *

Midland and Great Northern Joint Railway The Midland and Great Northern Joint Railway (M&GNJR) was a railway network in England, in the area connecting southern Lincolnshire, the Isle of Ely and north Norfolk. It developed from several local independent concerns and was incorporated ...

( LMS, LNER) * Norfolk and Suffolk Joint Railways Committee ( LMS, LNER) * Oldham, Ashton-under-Lyne and Guide Bridge Junction Railway Company * Otley and Ilkley Joint Line Committee ( LMS, LNER) * Severn & Wye Joint Railway ( LMS, GWR) *

Somerset and Dorset Joint Railway The Somerset and Dorset Joint Railway, also known as the S&D, SDJR or S&DJR, was an English railway line connecting Bath (in north-east Somerset) and Bournemouth (now in south-east Dorset but then in Hampshire), with a branch from Evercreec ...

( SR, LMS) * South Yorkshire Joint Line Committee ( LMS, LNER) Joint railways between the four major constituents and others were: * East London Railway Joint Committee ( LNER, SR, London Transport) * Metropolitan and Great Central Joint Committee ( LNER, London Transport) * Watford Joint Railway Committee ( LNER, {{frac, 1, 2 London Transport)

Minor railways and light railways

East Kent Light Railway The East Kent Light Railway was part of the Colonel Stephens group of cheaply built rural light railways in England. Holman Fred Stephens was engineer from its inception, subsequently becoming director and manager. The line ran from Sheph ...

Kent and East Sussex Railway The Kent and East Sussex Railway (K&ESR) refers to both a historical private railway company in Kent and East Sussex in England, as well as a heritage railway currently running on part of the route of the historical company. Historical compan ...

Mersey Railway The Mersey Railway was the first part of the passenger railway connecting the communities of Liverpool, Birkenhead, and now the rest of the Wirral Peninsula in England, which lie on opposite banks of the River Mersey, via the Mersey Railway T ...

North Devon and Cornwall Junction Light Railway The North Devon and Cornwall Junction Light Railway was a railway built to serve numerous ball clay pits that lay in the space between the London and South Western Railway's Torrington branch, an extension of the North Devon Railway group, an ...

Shropshire and Montgomeryshire Railway The Shropshire and Montgomeryshire Light Railway was a railway running from Shrewsbury, England to Llanymynech, Wales, with a branch to Criggion. It was promoted by Holman Fred Stephens, better known as Colonel Stephens, proprietor of several ult ...

Irish railways

Irish railways owned by the LMS (the

Northern Counties Committee The Northern Counties Committee (NCC) was a railway that served the north-east of Ireland. It was built to Irish gauge () but later acquired a number of narrow gauge lines. It had its origins in the Belfast and Ballymena Railway that opened ...

and

Dundalk, Newry and Greenore Railway The Dundalk, Newry and Greenore Railway (DNGR, DN&GR) was an Irish gauge () railway in Ireland. It was conceived in the 1860s to provide a link between the towns in its title and the London and North Western Railway port at Greenore, from ...

lines) were also acquired but the NCC was quickly sold on to the

Ulster Transport Authority The Ulster Transport Authority (UTA) ran rail and bus transport in Northern Ireland from 1948 until 1966. Formation and consolidation The UTA was formed by the Transport Act 1948, which merged the Northern Ireland Road Transport Board (NIRT ...

, the transport unit of the

Government of Northern Ireland The government of Northern Ireland is, generally speaking, whatever political body exercises political authority over Northern Ireland. A number of separate systems of government exist or have existed in Northern Ireland. Following the partitio ...

as a result of the

Ireland Act 1949 The Ireland Act 1949 is an Act of the Parliament of the United Kingdom intended to deal with the consequences of the Republic of Ireland Act 1948 as passed by the Irish parliament, the Oireachtas. Background Following the secession of most ...

. The Dundalk, Newry and Greenore Railway closed in 1951.