Handsworth Wood station opened in 1896 eight years after the short link
line was built by the LNWR between their New Street to Wolverhampton High Level and their
New Street to Walsall lines. As with the other station on the line, Soho Road, Handsworth
Wood closed during the second World War never to reopen. However, unlike Soho Road there are
still clues as to its existence extant at the site and, perhaps due to its more picturesque setting
in Handsworth Park, it appears to have caught the interest of the railway photographers of the period. The
above photograph (photo: Birmingham Libraries) shows the station in its deep cutting setting between a short tunnel
ahead under Hamstead Road and a bridging of the tracks by Handsworth Park, the vantage point from
which the photograph was taken. |
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Above-left we are on Hamstead Road and immediately to the right of the large section of
red brick wall ahead is the padlocked gate securing the entrance to the pathway down to the platform
for trains heading for the New Street - Wolverhampton High Level line. Above-right we have walked along a
pathway that flanks the railway and leads from Hamstead Road, that can be seen ahead, and can be found in the
extreme right of the previous shot: the railway is to our right. |
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It is from the aforementioned path that we get the above-left perspective that is looking
directly down the steps leading from the station entrance path seen on the left-hand embankment
in the photograph at the top of this page. Above-right we are also looking down the embankment to the
station site and both shots give a good impression of the steepness and depth of the cutting in which the station
stood. Unfortunately, I could not fathom out a way to get either to track level, or a sufficiently foliage-clear
shot of the trackbed itself to provide a good comparison with the photograph at the top of this page.
Thus, I cannot confirm with any degree of certainty whether or not anything exists at track level of the old
station, although I am fairly certain that it would not. |
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