GEC Traction (GECT) was formed in 1972 as part of the GEC Power Engineering Group following earlier amalgamations of the traction divisions of the General Electric Company (GEC), the English Electric Company (EE) and Associated Electrical Industries (AEI). A wholly owned subsidiary company of GEC, the company had offices and works, located at Trafford Park in Manchester, at Strand Road in Preston, and at Attercliffe Common, Sheffield. The headquarters of GEC Traction was Trafford Park, Manchester (previously the headquarters of English Electric-AEI Traction) with design of rotating machines at Preston and Sheffield, and manufacturing activities for control equipment at Manchester and Preston. GEC Traction designed and manufactured a full range of traction machines and control equipment for electric vehicles, including electric locomotives and multiple unit trains for main-line and mass-transit railway systems (dc up to 3,000 volts, and ac up to 50,000 volts), diesel-electric locomotives and trains, mining and industrial locomotives, tramcars and trolleybuses. GEC Traction was the leading supplier of traction equipment in the UK and had a wide market around the world, particularly in South Africa, Australasia, Hong Kong, South Korea, South America and Pakistan. In 1979 the Industrial Locomotive Division of the former English Electric which was based at Vulcan Works, Newton-le-Willows was merged into GEC Traction, which later became a separate company, GEC Industrial Locomotives Ltd. During the late 1980s and 1990s the firm underwent major rationalisation, involving closure of several sites including Attercliffe Common in Sheffield in 1985 and the company’s headquarters at Trafford Park in Manchester in 1998. The company name GEC Traction endured until a merger with the French Alsthom group in 1989, which created GEC Alsthom Traction, which was still a branch of the main company GEC Alsthom.

In 1900 the British Westinghouse Electrical & Manufacturing Co Ltd bought land in Trafford Park and built a factory which went into production in 1902 for the manufacture of mechanical and electrical equipment for the generation, transmission and use of electricity. In 1919, Trafford Park Works became owned by British Westinghouse’s successor, Metropolitan-Vickers Electrical Company (MV). The main shops, in common with factory construction throughout Trafford Park, were single floor type, with bays 1,000 feet in length, and had direct railway communication with the docks and trunk systems of the country. The main office block was a copy of the Westinghouse building in Pittsburgh, USA and the factory was to the American design and used imported steelwork for construction. Products manufactured at the Works included gas engines, stationary steam engines, electric generators, transformers, switchgear, meters, motors, control gear, and arc lamps. During the First World War, British Westinghouse built some small petrol-electric locomotives for the War Department Light Railways. In 1928 the Works were taken over by Associated Electrical Industries (AEI), which merged Metropolitan-Vickers and British Thomson-Houston, though these two companies continued their own trading names. Traction design and manufacture was always a minority of the workload at Trafford Park with the largest operations generally turbine manufacture. Very few vehicles were built there, and traction machines (i.e. motors, inductors and generators) were largely built in other places – notably at Sheffield or Rugby. Trafford Park traction manufacture was largely that of assembling control gear – contactors, switches, drivers’ controllers, camshaft controllers, relays etc. and building these into frames or equipment boxes for installation in vehicles made elsewhere. An important part of the Trafford Park Works site was the general switchgear operation, mainly for generation or distribution installations. The on-site Switchgear Testing Company was a “testing house” for these products and contributed to testing and development of traction circuit breakers and switchgear. During the Second World War MV acting for the Ministry of Aircraft Production produced more than a thousand Lancaster Bombers in the adjacent Mosley Road building. The company also manufactured war munitions and in the laboratories developed what became known as Radar. In 1959 the newly formed AEI Traction Division established its headquarters at Trafford Park, with a product range that included electric and diesel-electric locomotives; electrical equipment for tram-cars, trolley buses and trolley mining locomotives and traction motors. AEI was taken over by the General Electric Company (GEC) in 1967 whose Witton Works closed in 1969, with the design office and traction manufacture transferred to Trafford Park, as a result of the GEC reorganisation and mergers. GEC Traction Ltd took over the Works in 1972. In 1990 the former Low Voltage Switchgear site at Trafford Park (West Works) was renovated to be the new manufacturing facility for GEC Alsthom Traction, with an electronics workshop, machine shop and plating baths, and an assembly shop for switchgear, equipment cases and power modules. This building was vacated in 1998 when power modules and switchgear was moved to Tarbes in south west France. The Works housed the administrative, commercial and accounting functions, the majority of the design departments and the development section with its associated workshops and laboratories. The manufacturing area was devoted primarily to the production of components of traction control and railway signalling equipment. In 1993, as part of the rationalisation of the equipment group, it was announced that the headquarters of GEC Alsthom Traction would move to Preston, leaving only Power Module design and manufacture at Manchester, with the eventual closing of all activities at Trafford Park in 1998. The iconic original Westinghouse building was demolished and the site is now (2015) largely devoted to container handling and logistics operations.

The brand London Transport came into being in 1933 and remained until 2000. Prior to 1933, the transport system in London was owned and managed by several independent and separate organisations. The Underground railways were developed and owned by the Underground Electric Railways Company of London (est. 1902) and the Metropolitan Railway (est. 1863) whilst the Tram and Trolleybus networks were under the control of various local authorities and public companies. The London County Council operated tram routes within the County of London but its responsibility did not extend to the bus or tram routes that ran outside its area and it did not hold responsibility for the railways which also extended into neighbouring counties. From 1933, the London Passenger Transport Board (LPTB) was established in accordance with the 1933 London Passenger Transport Act and covered both the County of London and adjacent counties within a 48-km radius. For the first time services within the London area were amalgamated. A significant proportion of tram routes were brought under the responsibility of the LPTB, as were the Underground Electric Railways Company of London lines and the bus services; this became known as the London Passenger Transport Area. It was then that the familiar ‘roundel symbol’ (designed in 1918) and the tube map designed in 1931 were adopted by the LPTB. The second World War was to cause some disruption to the ongoing programme, resulting in delays and also the abandonment of some projects. During the post war years, the transport authority was the London Transport Executive until 1962. It was taken into public ownership and London Transport and British Railways were under the same jurisdiction for the first and only time. It was during this time that recruitment began directly from the Caribbean and work began on resolving war damage to stock and stations as well as the completion of projects previously delayed during the war. The post-war years also saw some major developments within London transport, including the withdrawal of both trams and trolleybuses and the introduction of the iconic AEC Routemaster bus in 1956. From 1963, the transport authority was the London Transport Board until 1969 and it reported directly to the Ministry of Transport and no longer held direct association with the management of British Railways. Public transport was not heavily invested in during this period and motor cars increased in popularity. Unprofitable railways across Britain were also closed. The 1960s also witnessed the opening of the underground Victoria line and also the introduction of the single-deck bus. From 1970, the Greater London Council was the transport authority and remained so until 1984. Control of green-coloured country buses and Green Line Coaches were passed on to London Country Bus Services which became part of the National Bus Company. As with many organisations during this period, London transport suffered a severe lack of funding from central government as well as major staff shortages. The inter-modal zonal ticketing system was also introduced in 1981. From 1984-2000 London Regional Transport was the transport authority and was also under direct state control, reporting to the Secretary of State for Transport. Under the London Regional Transport Act in the 1980s subsidiary companies were established to run Underground and bus services. This period also saw the inclusion of British Rail services into fare options and the opening of the Docklands Light Railway in 1987. From 2000 to the present day, the transport authority has been Transport for London (TfL). Unlike its predecessors, it has never been commonly known as London Transport and holds responsibility for many other transportation functions such as road management, taxi and private hire licensing and also cycling and walking. Responsibility for the Underground was not given until 2003. TfL have been the longest running transportation organisation in London to date.