The Liverpool Overhead Railway opened in 1893 with lightweight electric multiple units in the Liverpool Docks, Lancashire, England. The railway was the world's first electric elevated railway and the first to use automatic signalling and electric signal lights. It was also referred to locally as the Docker's Umbrella. In the early 1900s electric trains ran on the Lancashire and Yorkshire Railway routes to Southport and Aintree; special trains to Aintree ran twice a year after these regular services were withdrawn. A local railway, it was not nationalised in 1948. However in 1955 a report into the structure of the viaduct showed major repairs were needed that the company could not afford. The railway closed at the end of 1956 and the structure dismantled the following year.