Oral history interview with David Wharton-Street, conducted and recorded by Michael Lee at the interviewer's home in Hertfordshire on 28 June 2019. Duration: 3 hr. 38 min. 43 sec. Early career; Acting Director Regional Railways North East (RRNE) 1990; British Railways Board Safety Department 1993; Safety & Standards Department; Railtrack secondment 1994; sectorisation; proposed closure of Settle & Carlisle line 1993; DalesRail trains deal; Friends of Settle & Carlisle; management of Settle & Carlisle route; Operational Research Computerised Allocation of Tickets to Service (ORCATS); Accountancy and Passenger Ticket Issuing System (APTIS); Portable Operated Ticket Issuing System (PORTIS); Class 47; Class 15x Sprinters; Ribblehead Viaduct repair; closure process; infrastructure maintenance issues; Hellifield signalbox; Serpell Report; Bob Reid 1; Jim O’Brien; Settle & Carlisle put up for sale; West Yorkshire Passenger Transport Executive (WYPTE); closure situation overview development of ORCATS; Computer Analysis of Passenger Revenue Information System (CAPRI); Monopolies & Mergers Commission (M&MC); Profit Planning & Cost Centre Analysis (PP&CCA); Accounting and Expenditure Information System (AXIS); development of Sector Accounting and Monitoring System (SPAMS); Local Vehicle Record System (LOVERS); Rail Vehicle Record System (RAVERS); sectorisation and structural change; Frank Paterson; David Rayner; RRNE management team; Mark Causebrook; David Prescott; Charles Devereux; Don Jary; RRNE after Organising for Quality (OfQ); Track Access Development Team; electrification; track cost allocation; financial penalties; prime user; costing; privatisation and timescales; safety; Safety Critical Staff Protocol

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.