Similar but not the same

I was happily driving along on one of the many badly maintained motorways the little country I traverse has, when I was overtaken by one of the, what I find, most classy, beguiling automobiles out on the road today. The Bentley. I have seen quite a few about in the last week or so. It could of course be the same car. I'll have to look out for the number plate. I was actually rater struck by the “B” Bentley logo.
I had never given it much thought, but it has an uncanny resemblance to the "B" logo of the National Railway Company of Belgium. The Bentley logo has the same typeset capital B. Or is it the other way round?
The logo was already on the Bentley 3.5 Litre, first car to be developed under the Rolls Royce ownership. Production on this fine car was started in 1933. Click here for pictures of one of the early 3.5 Bentleys. As you will clearly see, the winged logo is already firmly fixed underneath that radiator knob.
The Belgian Railway logo was designed by Henri Van de Velde in 1936. He was an artistic adviser to the Belgian cabinet at the time and could have nudged the board of directors to choose (t)his design.
In November 2001 The Art collections Weimar (Kunstsammlungen zu Weimar) started to compile a catalog of Henry van de Velde's works, and the designs for the logo should be among them. I haven't seen them and don't know how the different designs looked or evolved before van de Velde actually settled on the logo still used today. We could assume he was familiar with the Bentley design and we could also assume this is just a case of coincidence. Just a sign of the times? Similar but not the same?
I think it is doubly interesting to see the wings of the Bentley logo resemble the emblem a lot of European railways used last century: the winged wheel, the ubiquitous Beaux Arts symbol of progress.
The railwheel combined with Mercuri's wings embodying the symbol of technological progress and swiftness. There are many versions of these still about on station buildings, more recently one has been restored to its original place.

On a side note: With the way things are going in this little country, it will be cheaper to run a Bentley in the near future instead of taking the train. If you're older than 26 and aren't yet enjoying your pension, public transport is more expensive than just filling up the car, even with soaring petrol and diesel prices today.