Railways around Coventry

Dozens more here: WarwickshireRailways.com

Excellent, I'm almost in heaven

Thanks Philip I don't think I ever saw a Jub in real life, or a green loco of any kind for that matter, except when visiting somewhere like Crewe My log book entries consisted mainly of Black 5, Standard 5, Black 5, Standard 5, oh look: an Ivatt! I saw some oddities on the line to Kenilworth though including a military train to Kineton hauled by a driver-coupled diesel. It may have been a Teddy Bear or a Ruston & Hornsby belonging to the military depot itself. The only thing I remember was that the drivers were coupled which was very unusual for a mainline diesel. There was also the occasional 'intruder' on the line from Western Region.

Hi all The Jubilee class were the poor performers, according to the views from reading the railway mags', never living up to the expectations. Overshadowed by the Black Fives that were officially lower rated. After the fire grate size problems were sorted for the locos to burn any old coal, the Jubs came into their own. They were the mainstay of the Birmingham to London two hour express which stopped at Coventry, sometimes having to stop twice with our short platforms & the regular length of the train being sixteen coaches or more. It was called the two hour because of the journey time & the frequency of service right throughout the day from five-am until eleven-pm. Several of the services were 'penal' for a guaranteed arrival time. Their last journey check-point time was out of Rugby, & so it was not unusual for a train to be twenty minutes early into Euston. Their best journey times were never beaten until 1994. That was some performance for a 1930s designed piece of British engineering. Hey, it's good with you on here! Best wishes, Dutchman.

My take on it Philip was that the Jubilee was a racehorse while the Black Five was a workhorse. It was the latter which mostly hauled the stopping trains I travelled on between Coventry and Manchester. I only wish I could remember whether the carriages were Period 3 Staniers or BR Mk1s?

Hi. Unlike the LNER, who named so many of their locos after race horses the Jubs were good for a lesson in geography. I liked the Black Fives. They were probably the best all-round performance loco of any of the classes, but my take on the Jubs was just that they received such bad press for their first fifteen years. Regards the coaches, I did have two rakes of four late Stanier (airfix). My Sean has them in store at his home as his first railway was period 1947 to 54. One set are early BR blood & custard & one set full matt LMS maroon. They do look nice but still have the LMS lettering, so are really out of place on our railway. Going to school from Foleshill two days most weeks, I witnessed the demise of the non corridor steam stock, which were replaced by all-maroon Stanier. That was about 1961.

This is the LNWR boundary post I mentioned at the top of Poplar Road by the cutting in Earlsdon, I had a job to find it as it's now totally covered in heavy ivy but managed to pull some of the ivy from around the top and received some strange looks from a couple of old ladies whilst doing so. It stands about 3 feet high and is hexagonal, although you can't see them in the photo it has LNWR cast around its base and down a couple of the fluted sides, sorry it could not be a better photo, but I might go back one day with my secateurs.

Thanks Catshed, I often use that footpath but had no idea up till now that was there!

Hi to you both. That is bril, I had no idea either. You're a star, Catshed. Thank you for that piece of Coventry industrial history.

Hi all Areas to the south & west of Coventry are already affected by the proposed "High Speed Rail Link" which routes itself from the London area to the Midlands. I say routes itself because as quick as a route is published it is changed. A pub that I enjoy dinner at in Berkswell will be destroyed, but although it is all in the future, lives & communities are already affected. I like progress, providing it is progress & not a vague notion where the homework has not been seen or thought through. In the UK, at the end of the nineteenth century, when the mass railway building era had almost come to an end, someone had the same idea of building a railway to eventually travel to the continent (through a channel tunnel, I may add) which would connect up with the industrial midlands. So what came to pass in 1899ish was the Great Central Railway. It was the last major railway route to be built in the UK & it was unique in that it was built as a fast main-line, avoiding anything that would slow it down. Is there a familiar ring to this? Most of the railways in the UK were fairly regional in construction, linking town with town. The first question that I ask is, where is it now? The answer is that Dr. Beeching closed it. One very short section remains as a preserved heritage railway that we can visit, about twenty five miles away from Coventry. Second question is why was it closed when forty years on, the same concept is what we have before us now? I have my own thoughts on these questions but what are yours. One thing that I am certain of is that if built, the effects on Coventry will be huge. As Coventry is currently on the arterial route between Birmingham & London, we enjoy getting to Birmingham or London in a very short space of time with frequent services. Try getting to Leicester by train from Coventry! It's quicker by bus, no joke! Go by train & you need to change. Two large cities, Coventry & Leicester, just twenty odd miles apart & you need to take a sleeping bag, nearly, in order to travel by train. You see, the building of the Great Central that passes through Leicester, altered the whole demographics of the area regarding communications. Will our grandchildren have to change trains to get to London, one day & will another Dr. Beeching come along & close it?

One of the main reasons traffic fell away from the Great Central Railway (GCR) was the advent of the motorways at that time, the GCR was the London extension to Marylebone and like you say was originally intended to go via a tunnel under the channel, they did actually start to build the tunnel but the general fear was that the French would invade us (sounds daft but that was around 1896). The whole line and infrastructure was also built to the continental loading gauge so that foreign stock could travel on our lines, it was always destined to be a freight line and as it passed through rural areas the stations never made money from passenger services and then along came Beeching and seeing the lines loss in freight and passengers it was ironic that England's last main line was the first and only main line to close. It would of course work now the railways are moving a lot more freight than they did then, a lot of the infrastructure and navigation is still there and what's gone can be easily replaced, there was a group trying to get it re-opened years ago but I'm not sure what's happened to that idea. The GCR (LNER) BR(E) line from Woodford Halse to Rugby was of personal interest to me in my early teens and became my first project to map and chart the line. Here a photo of what was called a 'Windcutter' freight. After the long 1 in 176 climb from Braunston a pair of double heading 9F's Nos 92011 and 92032 head out of Catesby Tunnel with a class H freight train on May 20th 1964, the destination is Woodford Halse.

Hi Catshed Thank you for your response & photo. Bril! I heard Mr. Riddles, the designer of the class 9Fs, stated that the Great Central was in his mind when designing the class. ps. I saw the Franco-Crosti boiler version going over the Rugby station fly-over a few times.

So I believe, it was certainly a good line for the 9F's. Those Franco-Crosti boilers were certainly odd looking, shame there's none preserved, here's one on the Dynomometer at Rugby Testing Station, another history project of mine Class 9F 2-10-0 'Franco Crosti' boiler locomotive no. 92023 on test July,1955. Note the roof chimney adapted for the side chimney as fitted to these rather unusual loco's, most were converted back to a normal 9F's as they didn't produce the results expected, none exist to my knowledge for this reason.

Hi & thank you again They were so odd to see in action. As you say the front chimney was only used for draughting & lighting up. When in operation, the exhaust was blasted from the ejector at the side of the top boiler. They would have been a nightmare to preserve because of the increased tube corrosion as a result of the concentration of much hotter sulphur gases. I believe that is the reason for the end of the experiment, as the actual performance of the locos before rotting from the inside was very good. I trust that you did well with your essay project. You really know your stuff. I did my essay on the Harrow disaster. Best wishes to you, Catshed.

Some great pictures of Midland Region locos there Philip but it's not one of my favourite Flanders and Swann songs.