Referring to my type bible (The Field Guide to Typography) Kinneir and Calvert also designed the Rail Alphabet for the British Rail rebranding in 1964. This has since been replaced by the Brunel typeface, following the privatisation of British Rail in the 1990s. Previous to the Rail Alphabet Gill Sans was used.
In 2005 Henrik Kubel and Scott Williams (A2-TYPE) digitised Rail Alphabet with Margaret Calvert.
The double arrow symbol designed by the Design Research Unit in 1964, as part of the British Rail re-branding, is still used today. Helvetica is used for travel safety information at stations and on board trains.
This jumble of sans serif typefaces over a small amount of time reminds me of my first jumbled travel information I encountered when travelling to Preston by train - 'Outward travel must not be in the past'. This may have the potential for content of a travel information poster, considering the complexity of the jumble of typefaces to reference.
Eye magazine have an interesting article about the digitisation of Rail Alphabet:
http://www.eyemagazine.com/feature/article/britains-signature
