mw0njm.
A Brummie Dude
yes i think that too. there is the club by york wood.
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Late 70s amateur Aerial Photos, city and south to Longbridge
- Thread starter T Q
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Without doubt, clearly no question at all .. also corroborated by the smaller nearby lake the way that it is. Thanks for the excellent input.
And you might have jogged my memory a little now. That was I think the turning point for the return journey north ... "pick a feature on the ground, and then turn the 'plane around" as I was taught
... and which also explains the second photo from the opposite direction, probably from directly overhead the smaller lake! Hindsight is a wonderful thing ... TQ
guilbert53
master brummie
Thanks a lot for taking the time to take those photos all those years ago, and for now posting them on this web site.
I went walking round Birmingham city centre today taking photographs (though it was raining so did not take many) but your photos are a reminder on how much the city centre has changed and continues to change.
For those interested in aerial photos of the city and surrounds here are a few from the 1960s that Birmingham Mail posted a few years ago
https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/news/midlands-news/see-birmingham-air-1960s-amazing-8836332
Thanks again for your photos T Q (I see you are a "master brummie" already even though you have just joined the site).
I went walking round Birmingham city centre today taking photographs (though it was raining so did not take many) but your photos are a reminder on how much the city centre has changed and continues to change.
For those interested in aerial photos of the city and surrounds here are a few from the 1960s that Birmingham Mail posted a few years ago
https://www.birminghammail.co.uk/news/midlands-news/see-birmingham-air-1960s-amazing-8836332
Thanks again for your photos T Q (I see you are a "master brummie" already even though you have just joined the site).
oldMohawk
gone but not forgotten
Looks like Olton Reservoir and quite a lot of building around it since you flew over it ...41353-7
A nice little lakeside community, goodness knows where. Looks pleasant, has/had a rather nice cricket pitch by the look of things, good to see someone had their priorities in order!
Not far from the Airport (wsw) and used to be a holding point for small aircraft while the big ones were landing.
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oldMohawk
gone but not forgotten
post#935541-10
Guessing a zoom-tryout from fuzziness, no idea of location but likely on line of departure so generally sorta-NW, so Marston Green ish ?
Looks like the junction of Willaston Road and Elmstead Road. I can see many similar features in the GE pic compared to the original. The one puzzle is the houses on the nearside of Willaston Road seem to have been demolished and rebuilt.
jmadone
master brummie
OM I think you're quite correct. The white houses in the foreground look just the same even down to the double garage on the end one.
oldMohawk
gone but not forgotten
We need TQ to tell us which seat he was sitting in and which side of the aircraft he was photographing from.
Did he take off north from runway 33 do a left turn towards Olton Reservoir or some other take off?
We could probably plot dots of the known locations on a map and join up the dots to find places in between ....
Did he take off north from runway 33 do a left turn towards Olton Reservoir or some other take off?
We could probably plot dots of the known locations on a map and join up the dots to find places in between ....
Looks like Olton Reservoir and quite a lot of building around it since you flew over it ...
Not far from the Airport (wsw) and used to be a holding point for small aircraft while the big ones were landing.
Undeniably so, and thanks for the perfect input.
You brought a couple of memories back as I used to fly out of Baginton, much more pleasant a base for jaunts.
My friend was only in Solihull however so was getting his licence at Elmdon, and it made more sense to go from there anyway given the initial aim of overflying the city for some photos, plus it gave him the P1 time for his logbook too.
But just occasionally I would do a roller at Elmdon for the higher-level experience of its zone protocols, although there was always something of a "please don't do that here too much" air about it though the Tower was never anything other than professionally appropriate of course though in later years did seem to routinely be wearing starched underpants/knickers.
Plus, I never really fancied practising engine failure on the climbout/turn there, didn't relish designating and committing to New Street or somewhere for the glide-in, lol, though it would have been fun then leaving the "climbing away" declaration just a tad late and see what tone of voice was used in the acknowledgement ... fun only until they took my license away and burned it I expect.
Anyway ...
Yes quite an amount of growth both inwardly and outwardly, but the years will do that and at least it appears to have involved a little in-keeping discretion. Still a shame about the quiet little cricket pitch however, even though there appears to be a bigger community (?) sports facility to replace it now - I know which one I would have preferred to play on
In passing: if your name/avatar is accurate, and I expect that both are, we may occasionally have been under the same roof.
From late 50s to late 60s, and then scaled back through the early 70s when life, profession and more began claiming more time, you would find me regularly at Silver Blades a good few nights a week either with friends or just pootling around for myself. Friday was always the set-in-stone evening for my personal social group, to be missed at your peril, though every evening was good. Saturdays a close second, but sometimes just to meet friends and and chat and watch/listen as people would go to the cinema first maybe, or some other teenscene place/thing, lol.
Some schoolday afternoons too when I didn't have lessons, and also occasional mornings for the entirely different atmosphere then of course, and especially Sundays for a while with a non-skater new early-girlfriend who wasn't allowed to date when there was school the following day, had a too-early curfew on Saturday, and whose strict Catholic parents had afternoon and evening Church plans for everyone on Sunday. So Sunday morning it was, parent-friendly because it was a "healthy pastime"!
Solihull too of course, though for most of my friends SB was more convenient so was the more-used. Never more than a pleasure skater, I would find it hard to put in to words just how big a part it played, how much fun, how many excellent times and super memories, that all added to my teen-years.
One above all in fact, for half way through one later SB session one of my friends came across, excited at having met a new girl but trying to be dead nonchalant about it, lol, saying to watch out for them circling holding hands (he made a point of stressing that part!) and come and say hello. We have now been married 53 years
When we come in to the City we tend to park in the Pershore St multi-storey for the best quick-escape, and have had plenty of mixed emotions as their neighbour declined, was demolished, and is now city-apartments. Progress is good, sometimes a bitch at the same time.
TQ
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oldMohawk
gone but not forgotten
Hi TQ
If you look at the Aviation related sections of the forum you will find I've posted a lot there.
I was a regular listener to the air bands and know the atc routines of BHX etc. I took many flights from the old terminal.
These days I 'fly' with the FSX flight simulator ... there are even a few screenshots from it on the forum !
The 1950s was the decade of my youth ... and a couple of years in the RAF.
Ref: my avatar ... if you have not already seen them have a look here.
birminghamhistory.co.uk
birminghamhistory.co.uk
oldmohawk
If you look at the Aviation related sections of the forum you will find I've posted a lot there.
I was a regular listener to the air bands and know the atc routines of BHX etc. I took many flights from the old terminal.
These days I 'fly' with the FSX flight simulator ... there are even a few screenshots from it on the forum !
The 1950s was the decade of my youth ... and a couple of years in the RAF.
Ref: my avatar ... if you have not already seen them have a look here.
Springhill Ice rink Summerhill Road
Hi rogerstan I too had great times at the ice rink Recall going accross thr rd on skates to the pub around 9.00 and then back till the rink closed then of to a Dance somwhere. The man at the door used to check the skates you were wearing to be sure that were not hired skates. That man...
birminghamhistory.co.uk
Silver Blades Ice Rink
Here's a photo of me and some friends at the Milk Bar in Silver Blades about 1970.
birminghamhistory.co.uk
oldmohawk
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guilbert53
master brummie
One thing I love about this web site is how one topic can then lead on to another topic.
This topic starts off with historic photographs from an airplane and is now talking about ice rinks and ice skating.
This topic starts off with historic photographs from an airplane and is now talking about ice rinks and ice skating.
We need TQ to tell us which seat he was sitting in and which side of the aircraft he was photographing from.
Did he take off north from runway 33 do a left turn towards Olton Reservoir or some other take off?
We could probably plot dots of the known locations on a map and join up the dots to find places in between ....
I was P2 so Right seat, though as-suitable I was leaning across, turning round, reaching over, lol ... a couple were even out of the rear windows in an arm-out stretch when something just looked good that way, I recall.
33, no recollection now from P2 of initial local instructions/departure.
Although I didn't use BHX myself very many times I can't recall ever going off 15 anyway. I was brought in on grass once, but just paralleling as a courtesy to a Heavy already declared Ready at entry for lineup.
The only guaranteed directionality is that which can be seen by the trailing edge/flaps where the wing is present, though bearing in mind the loop (banana!) was generally Elmdon-City-Longbridge-S/City-Elmdon, most of the photos are readily placed already with just a couple still puzzling, and it is only the initial departure-tracking and any positioning on the return that leave a couple more at the ragged edges.
Interestingly, just last night it came to me that with the gaps filling it should soon be possible to reasonably estimate the path on a map and potentially help home-in on remaining others
TQ
Hi TQ
If you look at the Aviation related sections of the forum you will find I've posted a lot there.
I was a regular listener to the air bands and know the atc routines of BHX etc. I took many flights from the old terminal.
These days I 'fly' with the FSX flight simulator ... there are even a few screenshots from it on the forum !
The 1950s was the decade of my youth ... and a couple of years in the RAF.
Ref: my avatar ... if you have not already seen them have a look here.
Springhill Ice rink Summerhill Road
Hi rogerstan I too had great times at the ice rink Recall going accross thr rd on skates to the pub around 9.00 and then back till the rink closed then of to a Dance somwhere. The man at the door used to check the skates you were wearing to be sure that were not hired skates. That man...Silver Blades Ice Rink
Here's a photo of me and some friends at the Milk Bar in Silver Blades about 1970.
oldmohawk
I'm jumping about a fair bit today, but will certainly get comfy and take a look this evening, thanks!
TQ
That's precisely how I randomly arrived at an Elmdon post on some thread or other, which brought my ancient photos to mind for the first time in pretty well 50 years of being stored in a box/es through a series of attics as we have variously moved houses, and started this thread off wondering if it would be of any interest!
oldMohawk
gone but not forgotten
Yes I notice the view of Willaston Road left of rwy 33 is from the north and the view of Radleys Railway tunnel right of rwy 33 is from the south. I'm having a go at putting placemarks on Google Earth ... but other things I need to do today.I was P2 so Right seat, though as-suitable I was leaning across, turning round, reaching over, lol ... a couple were even out of the rear windows in an arm-out stretch when something just looked good that way, I recall.
33, no recollection now from P2 of initial local instructions/departure.
Although I didn't use BHX myself very many times I can't recall ever going off 15 anyway. I was brought in on grass once, but just paralleling as a courtesy to a Heavy already declared Ready at entry for lineup.
The only guaranteed directionality is that which can be seen by the trailing edge/flaps where the wing is present, though bearing in mind the loop (banana!) was generally Elmdon-City-Longbridge-S/City-Elmdon, most of the photos are readily placed already with just a couple still puzzling, and it is only the initial departure-tracking and any positioning on the return that leave a couple more at the ragged edges.
Interestingly, just last night it came to me that with the gaps filling it should soon be possible to reasonably estimate the path on a map and potentially help home-in on remaining others
TQ
.. Oh, and "aeroplane" please, "airplane" is so vulgarly American and not at all Bitish!
Apologies as well as thanks for the link guilbert53 ... I seem to have missed you yesterday among my comings-and-goings.
Keep taking your photos, 50 years from now future generations will be looking at them marvelling at how wonderful it is to see what things were like way back in the Olden Days of 2020!
TQ
oldMohawk
gone but not forgotten
Hi, JudiM,I think that's Newtown. The Lucas factory being the triangular bit more or less centre. The row of 5 tower blocks would be on New John Street West. I lived for about 18 months in the white tower block that's on the left near the bottom of the photo.
Spot on, I agree you have found the location it is Newtown.
A view from Google Earth shows the tower blocks on New John Street. The group of three towers on the right and in the top of the pic the BT tower slightly left of centre.
Good to hear it is a piece of green in the city again and not been built-upon for the past 20-30-40 years! I'll have to take a moment and stop for a look when around that way some time.
Just looked on Google Maps and wow that entire area has changed so much! I would never have placed that without some serious help, so thanks for the input. Even knowing the New John St West tower blocks, the one thing that made it fall in to place was still just the teeny-tiny green-clad roof on a church just across NJStW from them, which was a pinprick on my photo. From that I could get a bearing on your own tower block on Guildford Drive (presumably?) and then home in on where the old Lucas premises would have stood.
When we first met, the girl that I later married worked at Lucas but their Foremans Road site in Hall Green. Not anything but a loose connection to this photo I know, but a connection none the less
I'll see if I can stretch it down a tad thenIf there was a tiny bit more at the bottom of this photo I could see what it used to look like where I am sitting now at work(opposite the ATV studios)
I was interviewed there one time for a piece on a TV programme ... they were figuring out where to do it and settled for heading through the building and out of the back, and I half-recall there somewhere being some kind of little semi-ornamental terrace-area with plantings etc but it escapes me now whether that was right there or just across a road from the building, however possibly it could even have been no great distance from where you are sitting today. Cool! Thanks for your super input JudiM, brilliant to have these insights and see connections ... and I hope work isn't interfering with your forum-browsing too much!
TQ
guilbert53
master brummie
Keep taking your photos, 50 years from now future generations will be looking at them marvelling at how wonderful it is to see what things were like way back in the Olden Days of 2020!
I did a similar thing as you in the 1980s (but on foot), taking many photos around the Broad St area and capturing the changes to that part of the city with the arrival of the ICC, Symphony Hall. NIA etc etc.
I then revisited the area in 2010 taking more photos.
I posted all my photos in 2019 in this BHF topic here (amazing "before" and "after" photos if I do say so myself !):
Convention Centre & Broad Street - historic photos
In the early 1980s Birmingham council began to clear the area around Broad Street to build the International Convention Centre (ICC), the National Indoor Arena (NIA), and Brindley Place, as well as many apartments. I went up there with my trusty camera (pre-digital of course) to try and capture...
birminghamhistory.co.uk
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JudiM
master brummie
Browsing confined to lunch break!!!
You wouldn't recognise where the tv studios was now, it's all gone (as has the Register Office). It's a building site at the moment, although the new building for the HMRC is near completion. I believe there is another 3 buildings to go up, but they will be adding a little green public space - although it's hard to see where they will shoe horn that in!
And yes, the tower block I lived in was in Guildford Drive.
You wouldn't recognise where the tv studios was now, it's all gone (as has the Register Office). It's a building site at the moment, although the new building for the HMRC is near completion. I believe there is another 3 buildings to go up, but they will be adding a little green public space - although it's hard to see where they will shoe horn that in!
And yes, the tower block I lived in was in Guildford Drive.
