CHANGES had to be made to help pupils from Ulverston, Grange and Cartmel get to school. 

In May of 1982 British Rail’s new timetable was slammed by watchdog group the Central Transport Consultative Committee.

One of the biggest faults that was found by the study was that changes to the timing of daily trains used by 50 pupils heading home from Ulverston Victoria High School to Grange and Cartmel.

Such was the chaos caused that lessons for 1,500 pupils were ended 20 minutes early as the new train timetable allowed only two minutes for the pupils to run to the station at the end of the normal school day.

The only other option was for them to hang around the station until 5pm.

In October 1980 it was revealed that there was one railway improvement that the Carnforth to Barrow line would probably never see – electrification.

British Rail official Brian Howard said: “British Rail would be delighted if it could electrify at least to Barrow.

“But in the national context it comes as very low priority.”

However, there was no longer a late night “whip” train from London to Barrow – the last departure from Euston would be 7.36pm.