Richard John Spoors was born in 1945 and joined British Railways: North Eastern Region in 1964 as a Student Civil Engineer. He then worked as a Senior Technical Officer in the Bridge Design Office at York after graduating from the University of Bradford. In 1971 he became a Resident Engineer at Barking before becoming a Maintenance Engineer, King's Cross and then an Assistant to Area Civil Engineer, Wimbledon on British Rail: Southern Region. He became Area Civil Engineer, Fratton before being appointed Divisional Civil Engineer, Nottingham in 1984, servingin in this capacity until 1988. In 1989, he became the Regional Civil Engineer at Glasgow and then Infrastructure Manager Scotland. He then moved to the British Railways Board’s Rail Privatisation Group as Project Director in 1992 and was responsible for the development of the Track Authority. He then undertook various senior positions in Railtrack including serving as Controller of Railway Group Standards in the Safety and Standards Directorate. He then worked for Railtrack’s successor, Network Rail, as the Head of Civil Engineering in West Coast Engineering, serving from 2002 until his retirement in 2005. He has since worked as a consultant railway civil engineer.