Oral history interview with Christopher Gibb, conducted and recorded by Frank Paterson (session 2) at Network Rail Headquarters, Waterloo, London on 14 March 2019. Duration: 2 hr. 4 min. 16 sec. Prism; Wales & West & Cardiff Valleys franchises; appointed Operations Director; optimistic bid assumptions; Class 14x Pacers; passenger growth; franchise bid process; Welsh Government; National Express bought Prism; appointed Managing Director; Strategic Rail Authority (SRA); Hatfield accident; Ladbroke Grove accident; Railtrack relationship; creation of Network Rail; Millennium Stadium development; Heart of Wessex line; rolling stock company (ROSCO) relationships; Class 158 issues; National Express Board; Managing Director Virgin Cross Country; Class 220 Voyager; transferred to Virgin West Coast; West Coast Main Line (WCML) upgrade; infrastructure shortcomings; changing relationships 1992-2002

One of over 150 oral history recordings made as part of the Britain’s Railways All Change (BRAC) archive project. BRAC was set-up to cover gaps in documenting the railway privatisation process in the United Kingdom, between 1994 and 1997, when the government-owned British Rail was dismantled into over 100 privately-owned companies. The interviews capture the recollections of people involved in the planning and implementation of the privatisation process, the management of change and running the railway during privatisation.