The programme opens at a bustling Snow Hill station, with steam much in evidence, before leaving for Stourbridge Junction via Soho and Winson Green, Handsworth and West Smethwick. Scenes at Stourbridge are followed by a return to the industrial Midlands, where trolleybuses still occupy the streets of Wolverhampton and Low Level station is host to Halls, Patriots and Western diesels. WCML traffic at Lichfield finds Duchesses, Jubilees, and Britannias in the company of blue electrics and ex-LMS diesel no 10001. To the north-west, Codsall, Shifnal and Shrewsbury are featured and to the south, the Lickey Incline and Bromsgrove.
Between 1959 and 1968, railway enthusiast and cine-cameraman, Michael Marsden, recorded views and sounds of the rapidly changing face of Britain's rail network. For over twenty-five years after steam ended, he captivated audiences throughout the country with his unique film collection that captured steam's last decade and the full emergence of the diesel locomotive. The blending of this film and that of other cameramen with true sounds of the era, plus an informative narrative, has resulted in the creation of this superb range of railway DVDs detailing the last decade of British mainline steam operations.