The preservation of steam locomotives in Britain was largely due to a scrap yards decision to prioritize scrapping the railcars first... 213 locomotives were saved from scrapping at just one yard, Barry in South Wales (thank you Paul!)

At the end of steam in the 1960s, Dai Woodham bought hundreds of withdrawn steam engines from British railways for his scrap business at Barry Island. He intended to scrap them but delayed doing so while he focused on scrapping redundant railway wagons. 

As a result, railway preservation societies flocked to Barry to select locomotives to restore to operate their lines. Out of almost 300 engines sent to Barry, almost three quarters were rescued from the graveyard, and over half lived to steam again.

The single act of not scrapping these engines helped create the Heritage Railway movement that exists in the UK today.

https://preservedbritishsteamlocomotives.com/the-barry-story/

https://robskinner.net/2022/03/30/steams-graveyard-barry-island-memories/