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New Street Station From 1854 - 1966

Do the litter bins tell us anything? The style of writing on the bin (right in the photo) might match other bins on the railway line perhaps? Viv.
 
mike jenks said:
Hi

This went past my eyes the other day. Its the closing down of a Cafe.
I cant remember much of the facilities.
I will keep trying interesting isn't it.

Mike Jenks
Click to expand...

It is the late '50s about the turn of the sixties, so let me take you for a short walk along New Street past where they have begun letting the new shops on the "big top" site and clearing the ground for the Rotunda opposite Times Furnishing.

Now turn right down along Worcester Street past the Midland Red booking office and it's wonderful relief map of their territory in the window and along past the back entrance to the Odeon.

Pass the bus stands for the 147 to Redditch, the 144 to Worcester and Bromsgrove with their brass chocks under the back wheels then over the railway bridges with New Street station on your right. Across the road is the old Market Hall where through the open doors you can see the pigeons flying through the sky where the roof once was.

Turn right along Queen's Drive and walk downhill toward the taxi ranks past the British Railway offices, passing cars rumble over the cobble sets. Overhead in front of you is the elevated footpath crossing Queens Drive which joined the two halves of the station together. This map should help get your bearings but the smell from the nearby Fish platforms on the Midland side will help on a foggy night.

New_Street_plan_Circa_1960.jpg

Just before the footbridge turn right and walk onto platform 6, then left along the platform.

After a few yards the "restaurant" is on your left though I suspect it has now closed for good as this is all about to be demolished for the new modern station above.

In a few months time you will be able to walk into John Lewis and stand above the old cafe.
 
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.
 

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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
 
Late '50s is the tail end of the Victorian station!


Noticed some old brick work today from the current platform 1.
 
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.
 
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.
 
The steam locomotive pictured......73031...built December 1953, and scrapped December 1965, also nearly 50 years ago. Never a London, Midland, Scottish Railway locomotive, when New Street Station, became LMS, and a part of the 'big four' amalgamation.

Could they not find an appropriate LMS steam engine photograph? There are thousands around. Typical of 'modern thinking'.

"Just put up a photograph of a steam engine, lads. That will do".

Eddie
 
You mean like the Birmingham picture in the brocure about Birmingham (England), which was of Birmingham Alabama. The problem is that, in the same way as politicians have, in most cases, got little knowledge of actual people, many arty film makers have little knowledge of anything other than how it looks and the effect of a film - the truth is of little importance
 
mikejee said:
You mean like the Birmingham picture in the brocure about Birmingham (England), which was of Birmingham Alabama. The problem is that, in the same way as politicians have, in most cases, got little knowledge of actual people, many arty film makers have little knowledge of anything other than how it looks and the effect of a film - the truth is of little importance
Click to expand...

Beautifully put, Mike
 
mikejee said:
You mean like the Birmingham picture in the brocure about Birmingham (England), which was of Birmingham Alabama. The problem is that, in the same way as politicians have, in most cases, got little knowledge of actual people, many arty film makers have little knowledge of anything other than how it looks and the effect of a film - the truth is of little importance
Click to expand...
https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/25...tyscape-of-Birmingham-Alabama-on-leaflet.html
This one here?
 
Ray Griffiths said:
Hi Folks.

Found this interesting picture of the old New St. Station Street entrance.

Ray
Click to expand...
Ray,
A very interesting photo indeed. I cannot remember the entrance loking like that so I
am wondering which entrance it was. It was certainly post war as the British Railways notice shows that it was when the railways were nationalised..
Old Boy
 
Ray Griffiths said:
Hi Folks.

Found this interesting picture of the old New St. Station Street entrance.

Ray
Click to expand...
Noting the tram/trolley bus overhead wires suggests to me that this is Station Street. The dirty state and rusted parts of the request bus stop suggests that it is not long after railway nationalization - the backlog of repairs and renewals were still very much in evidence for a couple of years or so after the end of WW2 (1946) and the very clean British Railways signage suggest it was not too long past when it was done. It would soon have gotten grimy in that busy part of the town.

I have amended post to read Station Street. Yet another senior moment. :eek:
 
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Just as I remembered the entrance in Queensway, when I left 'Brum' in the fifties. The entrance, where the man with the cap is standing, was to the over bridge that ran through New Street station, the other end coming out into New Street. A dark and very smoky bridge to walk along, with the station platforms beneath the bridge, and the platform entrances leading off the bridge. which was all covered in. The photograph would be 50/60's, because that was when Billy Cotton was in his prime, with his radio show, and Alan Breeze was his singer. If I had to be more accurate, I would suggest late 50's.

Definitely not 1920's.

Eddie
 
norfolk brummie said:
Just as I remembered the entrance in Queensway, when I left 'Brum' in the fifties. The entrance, where the man with the cap is standing, was to the over bridge that ran through New Street station, the other end coming out into New Street. A dark and very smoky bridge to walk along, with the station platforms beneath the bridge, and the platform entrances leading off the bridge. which was all covered in. The photograph would be 50/60's, because that was when Billy Cotton was in his prime, with his radio show, and Alan Breeze was his singer. If I had to be more accurate, I would suggest late 50's.

Definitely not 1920's.

Eddie
Click to expand...
Hello Eddie,
The Queensway was not constructed until well after WW2.I think you may have meant Queens Drive. I do not think it was Queens Drive because, if my memory serves me correct ,no buses or trams went down Queens Drive. I am inclined to go with the Station Street suggestion,
Old Boy
 
Old Boy said:
I do not think it was Queens Drive because, if my memory serves me correct ,no buses or trams went down Queens Drive. I am inclined to go with the Station Street suggestion,
Old Boy
Click to expand...

My apologies......NOW! I remember. It has been sixty years since I last saw it all. The footbridge went OVER Queens Drive (not Queens Way, as I previously suggested), and there were no buses, or trams, that ran down Queens Drive. Yes, it is Station Street. Still, I was not far out in my date, I did suggest the fifties. In fact Billy Cotton made more than one appearance at the old Hippodrome. His singer, Alan Breeze, came to live here in Norfolk, but that's another story.

I have never known the modern New Street Station, but the 1940's era I knew very well. Many a happy Saturday, and holidays, running along the old bridge dashing from platform to platform to catch the old LMS/British Rail steam engine numbers.

Also in the wartime years, I would arrive there for home, and the holiday period, from my school.

Then again, in January 1952 to Darlington, then on to Catterick, to commence National Service.

Eddie
 
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