Weekend (and a bit!) Variety - 3

It Once Looked Very Different

Clearly, the large car park at Sutton Coldfield station would have once been a goods yard. That much is obvious.

An old map reveals, however, a railway line terminating at Sutton Coldfield ...

... and serving a few villages, like Erdington, on the way.

An old timetable is equally revealing ...

... with a typical branch line schedule showing a service every hour, roughly, with journeys missing out some of the intermediate stations. For the record, please note that Vauxhall became Vauxhall and Duddeston, then just plain Duddeston.

Duddeston is typical of an inner suburban station that had become minimalised.  Historically it had four platforms, although reduced to two in normal operation.

With the main building being on the road bridge, platform facilities were reduced to the status of "hut" ...

... then "improved" with a lavish construction in brick - with the added luxury of "Gentlemen".

Now all you can enjoy is seats and a shelter!

But it is a very tasteful shelter!

But we digress.

Here is a plan of the original Sutton Coldfield terminus station.

North is to the right, the Station Hotel stands, but the access is from Station Street where today's "side" entrance stands.

Note the provision of an "arrival" platform and a turntable.

The substantial station buildings were on the departure platform ...

... needed for some fairly substantial departing trains!

Certainly the facilities were a bit better than Vauxhall/Duddeston,  even when that station was at its best!

But we now need to explore the line's extension from Sutton to Lichfield.

The station was constructed in 1862, as the northern terminus of the line from Birmingham built by the London and North Western Railway. In 1884, the line was extended north to Lichfield, and after the grouping of railway companies in 1923, it came under the control of the London, Midland and Scottish Railway.

More Mr Khan Super Loopy Stuff 

What goes around, comes around!

It seemed a good idea at the time! The above would have been a slick,  limited stop bus service linking regeneration sites from North Greenwich via Woolwich ....

... and Thamesmead to Abbey Wood. It might have been operated by articulated trolleybuses, all ready,  prophetically, for the climate crisis!

What appeared was a very ordinary bus 472 ...

... from North Greenwich ...

... to Woolwich ...

...and Thamesmead ...

... later extended to ...

... Abbey Wood! 

The 472 has a whisper of the Greenwich Waterfront Transit about it; but with nothing special that might allow it to be called "Transit"!!

Now we hear that Mayor Khan has had one of his jackpot ideas!

Readers will remember that, although Mt Khan's round London Superloop looked as if the ends were close at Thamesmead and North Woolwich, they weren't. You needed a 472 bus between Thamesmead and (south?) Woolwich, plus a ferry or a foot tunnel to complete the loop.

But Mr Khan is on the job. He has announced a proposal to go our to consultation (Yeah, Right - he will do it anyway!) for an extra bit tacked on to the original non looping not-so-super loop.

It is, in fact, the 472 in a very thin disguise; which, in turn, is the Greenwich Waterfront Transit in an even less spectacular disguise.

So clearly it will be a slick, limited stop bus service linking regeneration sites from North Greenwich via Woolwich and Thamesmead to Abbey Wood.

Soungs familiar?

Did Mr Khan actually think of this himself (VERY unlikely) or did a lowly minion find the Transit idea in a dusty filing cabinet and hand the scheme to his Mayorship all ready for the consequent public and political approbation.

All he needs now is to re-brand the Woolwich Free Ferry as route SF1 (Super Ferry 1) ...

... and the sub fluvial footway as ST1 (Super Tunnel 1) ...

... and the loop can be joined, Super all the way!

More from Sutton Coldfield and more from the "Loopy" Mr Khan tomorrow.

 Next Weekend-and-a-bit blog : Tuesday 4 Feb