Reader Galleries - Page 2

Photos submitted by readers of Rail Around Birmingham

The following photographs were taken of Langley Green station in 1993 by Bernard Shaw who kindly sent them to me and gave his permission for them to be displayed here. They show the station as it was before the old buildings were removed and replaced by the booking office in situ today and at a time when the GWR Oldbury extension was still in use, and controlled by a signal box, serving Albright and Wilson's chemical works at Oldbury.

In this shot we can see the now demolished booking office on Western Road perched above the Birmingham platform.

Again, here we see the booking office and also, through the footbridge, the signal box controlling the Oldbury branch and Rood End sidings just beyond the station.

Here we get a closer look at the signal box from Western Road with the Oldbury branch to the left off-camera.

This shot was taken on the Birmingham platform showing the signal box and the Oldbury branch heading-off to Albright and Wilson's chemical works to the left. Ahead are Rood End sidings: the station is now to our rear.

This is an interesting and unique shot inside Langley Green signal box showing the array of levers required to control the junction and sidings.

Here we are standing at the end of the Birmingham platform with the signal box to our left looking along the now defunct Oldbury branch towards Albright and Wilson's chemical works.

Ray Durrant kindly sent me the following four photographs of Rushall Crossing on the South Staffordshire Railway's Walsall to Lichfield line that shed some light on what used to be at the site as I had not previously seen any shots of this part of the line. The photos were taken in 1984 and show all that remained of the railway some 75 years after the station had been demolished.

In this shot, Ray was standing on the site of the old station looking to the level crossing and signal box on Station Road and beyond them towards Pelsall and Lichfield beyond.

This shot is taken from Station Road giving a great view of the box and barrier looking towards Walsall.

To get your bearings, the pitched roofing of the factory seen to the left of this shot and beyond the signal box in the first shot of the series can be discerned through the bushes on the right of the last photograph on the Rushall Station page.

A final shot of the now demolished box in a spot where you'd now be hard pressed to discern a railway had ever been.

The following shots show the seldomly photographed site(s) of Newton Road station. The shots of the crossing, apart from the black and white shot, are largely from 1973/1974 - four years before the signal box was removed - and show it in a very neglected state. The photos were sent in by Gareth and give a great glimpse into the past at, what is now, a rather remote and desolate spot.

Long-gone signal box at the site of Newton Road station versions 1 and 3 at the junction of Charlemont Rd/Ray Hall Lane, seen here in 1960.

The crossing site again some 20 years later minus signal box and with the M5 looming to the left.

A slightly earlier shot than previosuly, apparently taken from the M5! This shows the signal box still in situ in 1972.

A lineside view of the signal box looking towards Birmingham with the station site to the rear.

The crossing gates looking very delapidated.

A Pendolino about to pass the site, roughly, of the second incarnation of Newton Road station in 2006.