Mr. Dair, bloody English, taking the world past steam power.
This is the Britain/England which was still using Steam Locomotives in the 1960s and then diseasels till the 1990s (in the main and still today in the minority) while the world being "taken past steam power" had moved onto Electric Locomotives in the 1930s?
I think, perhaps, you need to remove the rose tinted glasses.
I think, perhaps, that you should do more research.
The reason was that they wanted to get their full use out of their locomotives. Britain, OTOH, scrapped a lot of locos prematurely (for several reasons).
You are missing the point. Getting the most use out of existing investment is very different to what happened in the UK. The UK was still investing Government Money in development of steam locomotives in the 1950s and building them into the 1960s.
Other countries were entirely electric by that date (or much earlier). And the UK was still ploughing taxpayers money into steam engines. Even in 2015 the UK does not have a completely electric railway.
Came back from Coventry to London via Oxford and Reading yesterday - saw the electrification out from London to Bristol is well underway. Scheduled for 2017 operations.
The Thatcher and Major governments electrified many hundreds of miles of railways - the east coast, London to Norwich, London to Cambridge and King's Lynn, and many others.
The Blair and Brown governments electrified ... nine miles (1), excluding the new-build HS1.
The Cameron governments are electrifying hundreds more miles.
The railways do better under the Conservatives than Labour. ;-)
Comments
I believe so, on the Derby to Crewe route.