Railways around Coventry

There's an interesting article in February's copy of "Steam Days" about Tile Hill station. It's an account of someone's visit to the station in 1954, and, as well as an historical background of the station, contains many photos and an OS Map extract of the area around the station.

Hi all, New bus interchange.

Possibly the last time City of Coventry was fully overhauled, about 1960/61. Picture off F/B. An absolute masterpiece of science & engineering, designed for a continuous HP rating of 2,500, a well trimmed crew on board would lift that to 3,000, possibly 3,500 for short periods. The Deltics were the first diesel electric locos to match that in performance. What a treat to see that beast move.

Hi all, Oh know it's me again, I reminisced coming out of the new Coventry station Warwick Rd exit. Like old days if I had been wearing my blazer & satchel at 8.30am in the morning.

While looking for photos of footbridges for a discussion on another topic, I came across the site ”The Railway Data Centre” which lists all the structures on sections of railway track. Local interest includes: Rugby-Coventry-Birmingham Coventry-Nuneaton Leamington Spa-Milverton Milverton-Coventry

Thanks to the brilliant Warwickshire Railways site we've seen a few images of the station of this era, but this is the first one I've seen of the area including the 'incline machine’' in colour.

The old exit onto Warwick Road was a wooden affair, that dozens of very well behaved, quiet as a mouse, grammar school boys could make bounce as we trampled our way out. It was only open at certain times of the day. Tramp, tramp, tramp, as it moved under our little feet.

The tracking system that I use: OpenTrainTimes. Click on maps, select your area & you can track just as though you were in the powerbox.

Similarly: Realtime Trains.

Hi all, I'm pushing the boundaries of this topic title, with what I'm sharing. Has the steam gone out of the enthusiasm for our heritage railways? I've been busy, yes busy, doing home domestics, me being a single occupancy resident these days. It's been many years since I visited a heritage railway, the SVR being the last, where I bought an extension or bolt-on ticket from Stourbridge. Are there lots more like me? I've viewed the live-cam pictures of several viewpoints on the SVR at several times during today, a ank Holiday. Platforms nearly empty, yet years ago, Bank Holidays offered most heritage railways their best revenue & promotion times. There's folk on the trains but nothing like the queuing & manic crowds of a decade ago. I certainly hope that they all fared better yesterday & Saturday. One day is only one day, of 365 throughout a year. I just wonder?

The Severn Valley Railway seems to be doing OK. The recent Steam Gala was a success. A lot of people pre-book their tickets on-line and this has cut back on queues at the booking office (although you can still pay on the day). Saturday is now the busiest day of the week (a change that started when shops opened on Sunday). I've seen the figures for Saturday and Sunday and it was "busy", but Bank Holiday weekends are not the big crowd pullers they used to be a decade ago. I've just got back from a few days in Spain and the flights cost less than a super off-peak return to London on LNW so overseas breaks are definitely back in play. It is hoped a purple engine will draw the crowds at the Platinum Jubilee weekend (and the rest of the summer).

Thanks Phil I forgot to mention that a very full charter ran from London to Kidderminster, on the 23rd, topped and tailed by Class 67s'. The charter train didn't go any further than Kidderminster SVR.

Hi all, The names given to locations is itself an interesting talking point. In Birmingham for example, what for half a century was called Gravelly Hill is now referred to as Spaghetti Junction by so many folk, even though prior to 1972, Spaghetti Junction didn't exist. The location of the old Foleshill railway station was actually referred to as Lockhurst Lane, the name of the Co-op, imprinted on folks mind. If the station had been built where the LNWR originally wanted to put it, roughly the site of the goods yard, it would have been called Lockhurst Lane station.

I've finished scanning the few images from the Holmes Family archive from Coventry Archive. Most are rural - you can see the collection in the galleries on Cov Dig. Here however is one of London Road: Post copied from topic London Road on 4th Aug 2022 11:08 am

Many on here will recognise this railway bridge - it carried the Rugby-Leamington Spa line over the A423 just south of Marton. Today I found that it has recently been demolished - I believe there were plans to construct a replacement to maintain the cycle/walk way along the old line.