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New Street Station 1967

That's a very sad photo Brumgum. I think Platform 9 was the one I used to get the Cheltenham train from - do matter what they do to New Street, it will never be the same, it had its own personality, never to be replaced.
 
The cafe also apparently had waitress service, of a sort. I certainly do not remember it.
 
mikejee said:
The cafe also apparently had waitress service, of a sort. I certainly do not remember it.
Click to expand...

Quite so, you sat at table pushed a button and after some time a lady appeared having walked down a passage between adjacent "booths" which seated four or six people.

At the time (circa 1966-7) it felt pretty cool and was certainly up a level from the Kardomah though quite soon the Formica facing over the plywood "boxes" in which you sat soon started to peel away and the aisles used by the waitresses ended up with a fine patina of trodden in grease. The seat covering material was plastic and very slippy but eminently wipe downable.

Late in the evening "gentlemen of the road" would often take up residence so by around 1985 they, and the booths, were cleared out in favour of those small raised round tables where you propped yourself against whilst slurping coffee from a paper cup. By then it wasn't at all cool.

New_Street_station_cafe_circa_1970.jpg

The Timeshift program was an excellent melange of film stock including the view from the cab of a Blue Pullman as it passed Bordesley station en route the city and brought back a couple of long forgotten experiences.

I, like a many other budding designers, made our way down to London in the summer of '65 to be interviewed by George Williams, then Director of Industrial Design in the hope we could join the party going on in his offices just off the Euston Road.

I can recall making a very, very early start in the Ford Popular heading down the A5 wearing my John Stephen suit arriving just in time for my time slot and parking outside St Pancras without a yellow line in sight.

Needless to say I didn't get an offer as I still had a year to complete at Gosta Green but was invited to return the following Spring. Sadly George passed away in November.... Hey ho
 
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I used New Street a lot in the early 60's, and cannot remember any café/restaurant, o that type anywhere on any railway station. Paul
 
I remember a cafe kind of thing at New Street Station, the walls were painted pale green (as everything seemed to be in those days) but I only remember tables and chairs and not 'booths'. I have heard recently that a widowed aunt of mine worked there, but no idea what date.
 
Hi shortie there was one there at one time in the period then they tried to rearrange it to self service and it was worst than the original
Design it was worst than ever and the que for paying was as long as a station platform and your coffee and what nots was cold when and if you could find a seat to sit on and it was around the time they put a turn stile out side the coffee stall and you paid a penny to get into the toilet
It was a fancy chrome stile which was havoc there was more people queuing up more than the coffee shop
 
Phil said:
The Cafeteria - Waiting Room was where it is indicated on this photo, both my grandmother and mother worked there. In fact my grandmother worked there until the day it closed. I have the same photo that Mike Jenks posted and the first time I saw it I though the woman in the photo might in fact be my grandmother, but on closer study I see that it is not her hair is much darker and she always wore a hairnet and hat whilst serving in the cafeteria.
Click to expand...

Same scene a few moments later:

birmingham-new-street-station-redevelopment-c-1965-courtesy-geoff-dowling.jpg
 
A new set of New Street demolition photos have appeared today on the

www.mirrorpix.com website.

Easiest way in is by typing in 'Birmingham' in the home page searchbox. Perhaps someone can get a more direct link for us? I personally think photo number 4 (with the British Oxygen truck on the left) is the most dramatic.
 
I used the station in the week when the electric trains first appeared, at the end of a journey which had started in Berlin.
In the late 1950's I used the station weekly and can't remember ever really looking at the architecture.
All I thought about was ....

What time does the train depart ?
Which platform ?
Can I get a seat ?

I last used the station in the 1990's on a morning journey to London and remember eating a very nice 'full English breakfast' during the journey.
 
New Street Station underwent an important transition between 1964 and 1967 which created the air port style station which was popular in its day but maligned since. I wonder when the work started in 2009 will be finished. Today it is simply a station hijacked by the retail trade
 
Just watched the demolition of New Street station (2015) which is covered in the programme Demolition: The Wrecking Crew on BBC2. New Street features as one of several demolitions. The New Street content is at 18 - 24 mins, 32 to 34 mins and 55 - 57 mins in the programme. Shows you a 'mega muncher', a vehicle especially built in Birmingham to tackle the demolition of the station. Presume this will appear on iPlayer in due course. It's episode 3. Viv.
 
I do not know if this is the right thread if not could a moderator direct it to a more appropriate place. In RAIL magazine this fortnight is an article with photographs of West Midlands Railways from the air and the first picture is a superb aerial view of New Street Station and the surrounding area. Very difficult for me to work out what is where, but the Rotunda is quite obvious. Is there a system for asking a magazine for permission to reprint it on the forum, because I am sure the mappers and historians would love to overlay it with old maps, and it is a fascinating view of the station from the air.

Bob
 
As reconstructed and reopened in March 1967, New Street Station was very different to the previous station on that site. Those earlier stations had changed with time eventually becoming one under the LMS. During the electrification of the West Coast Main Line, Birmingham New Street was rebuilt in concrete, with the Pallasade Shopping Centre and a Car Park above it.

In the days of British Railways it became an important interchange point for the long distance loco hauled services the cross country semi fast routes and the local commuters. During the 1970's a wide variety of locomotives could be seen there including the various electric locomotives used on the line to London Euston and the North West. In those days the Liverpool service was locomotive hauled. It was common for locomotives to run around their trains there and railwaymen in the shunting grade were employed to uncouple and couple the stock. Services from the South West and the South destined for Sheffield, Leeds, York and Newcastle would pass through with locomotives including the Peak Class in regular regular use, the Western class, might also venture to New Street, but would rarely work north.

It was a station of shadow and light and often provided the opportunity for the photographer to capture the mood.
140066.jpg
 
When built in the 1960s most of the trains would be loco hauled and the locos would stand outside the covered area so much of the exhaust would be dissipated. As more trains became diesel multiple units these engines would be distributed along the train so that many of them would be exhausting into the covered area. This applied not just to the local services but also to long distance trains such as the Voyagers on the cross Country services and some Virgin services. I know that there were extractor fans but these could not clear the air completely.

With the new station there seems to be more attempt being made to make use of the A and B designations on the platform numbers so that the trains stop near the ends of the platforms rather than in the middle of the platforms as they did with the 1960s station. They can do this now that there are two sets of escalators for most platforms.
 
There is clear concern for the diesel exhaust fumes that are the byproducts of chiefly the Cross Country units and Transport for Wales, but are also from the Virgin Voyagers that pass through. It is an increasing threat to health in confines of a station where the open areas have been reduced through the making of Grand Central. Whilst there is an obligation to switch off the engines of standing for long periods, the trains passing through continue to pollute. The health consequences for station platform staff must be a concern to Network Rail. The number of services that use the station have increased since privatisation, but units are often smaller in size, as the franchise hires all of its stock and this a cost that has to be balanced against profitability. Platforms could have two or even three units in at time, and if diesel powered contributing the noxious gases and particles to the immediate area for all to inhale.
 
Heartland said:
There is clear concern for the diesel exhaust fumes that are the byproducts of chiefly the Cross Country units and Transport for Wales, but are also from the Virgin Voyagers that pass through. It is an increasing threat to health in confines of a station where the open areas have been reduced through the making of Grand Central. Whilst there is an obligation to switch off the engines of standing for long periods, the trains passing through continue to pollute. The health consequences for station platform staff must be a concern to Network Rail. The number of services that use the station have increased since privatisation, but units are often smaller in size, as the franchise hires all of its stock and this a cost that has to be balanced against profitability. Platforms could have two or even three units in at time, and if diesel powered contributing the noxious gases and particles to the immediate area for all to inhale.
Click to expand...
Will these diesel units have to pay to enter the Clean Air Zone?
 
Of course from 1967, there were many electric locomotives and units working to New Street. In the early days
there was variety of different types. These were part of the clean revolution for transport, and as said the diesel locomotives were often in the open. Diesel Multiple units were less in those times, by comparison, as previously stated.


140078.jpg
 
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Having travelled on Cross Country from Totnes to York most stations seem to be open to the sky and those such as Leeds are still quite airy. New Street, however, is a miserable gloomy place and even with modern lighting that is now there is is unwelcoming. Of course the principal reason is that New Street, above tracks, is a shopping mall rather than a railway hub.
 
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