Tag: Station

January 27th – I was stood on platform 5 waiting for a train at New Street Station. I looked up at the odd, tube-like access bridge hastily added as a second access system here in the early 1990s, in the wake of the Kings Cross Fire; because New Street was classed as a subterranean station, it had to have separate access. So cranes added this monstrosity, now out of use. 

Looking up in my early morning fug, I noted the arrangement of walkways, barriers, rails and safety harness mounting points spanning the top of the structure.

The only purpose to be up there is to clear the skylight windows.

If you design something, and most of the complex steelwork is to ensure the safety of a window cleaner whose job is to clear less than 15 square meters of glass, you’ve failed as a designer.

Sadly this monstrosity looks set to survive the renovations.

22nd January – In Birmingham, I was intrigued by this venerable old Claud Butler well locked up outside Moor Street station. When this was new it would have been a very expensive bike indeed – the brand was considered the Rolls Royce of bikes back when I was a lad, but not so much now. This seems fairly true to the original, too; down tube shifters, tight angled quill stem, lugged steel 501 frame and cotterless cranks.

This is clearly a favourite ride for someone, and looks like a well loved and well ridden steed. It’s also a remnant of a great cycling tradition.

January 16th – As much as I’m growing to loathe the results of the renovation of New Street Station in Birmingham, the process is still fascinating me. One of the things I like about it is how normal conventions of public buildings are broken. There is serious civil engineering going on at the same time as huge numbers of people and trains pass through this humming interchange..

Odd things happen.

Personnel appear from hidden doorways and gaps. There are odd noises and bangs. Occasionally, you get sprayed with water, or dust. Lifts and stairs appear, and then are boarded up again. cables dangle and tangle above the headspaces, and snake and race through the girders and scaffold.

One of the things you see here you don’t elsewhere is engineering graffiti. Surveyors measure. Sparkies test. Cladders clad. All of them leave their marks and datums scribbled on walls, floors and hoardings. Sometimes, they make sense. Often, they’re just mysterious glyphs, whose purpose is only known to those with the skill. I love how they ebb and flow with the focus of the work.

Spotting them is something to do while you wait…

January 9th – The journey home was similarly blessed; the weather was good, and the trains on time. At Walsall I got that Late Night Feeling thing again, and couldn’t resist a shot of platform 1, which always feels a bit like Walsall’s very own platform 9 and three quarters. 

I even had a decent exchange with another cyclist at the lights in Rushall. Can’t be bad.

January 3rd – I was back in Telford today, only the weather wasn’t quite as nice. I was fortunate really, as I expected us have much more rain than we did, and the winds here weren’t as bad as forecast either. I caught a short, heavy shower as I arrived at Telford, and sat it out for five minutes on the covered walkway that forms the station bridge and connects it to the town centre. I could see light on the horizon, and the downpour soon lightened. 

The geometry of that walkway fascinates me; it’s very 1980s, but also very solid. Dingy at night, it could do with better lighting, but it’s not a bad piece of urban design, really.

November 27th – Today, I spotted something I’d never noticed before at Birmingham Moor Street Station: a robin nesting box. Painted to blend in with the brickwork, someone who cares for the structure of this station also cares about the urban birdlife. I shall keep an eye on it next spring and see if it is used.

Top marks, Chiltern Railways. Top marks.

November 21st – I returned to Shenstone quite late, and the night was fascinating here, too. I never tire of that station; it’s got no facilities whatsoever, but the atmosphere and architecture make it one of the most lovely stations in the Midlands.

I’m fascinated by the feeling of isolation here at night, the islands of light and the elegant perspective.

I was captivated, too by the chap waiting for his lift under the streetlight on the corner of the car park. A long range, grainy shot, but there’s something about it I can’t explain.

November 21st – At the other end of the day, it was even colder. But the air had developed that hard, glassy-clear quality that it only really develops in winter; when even sounds seem sharper. I noticed as I hopped between stations that the view of the mid-renovation New Street Station, Bullring and Smallbrook from the access bridge was quite stunning, so I stopped to photograph it a while.

Quite surprised I wasn’t collared by the ever-present security as I took these, to be honest…

November 21st – In contrast to the day before, it was bright and sunny, but there was a keen wind and it was rather cold. A typical winter morning, in fact, and today it really did feel like the inexorable slide toward Christmas was underway. 

Moor Street Station was as light, airy and beautiful as ever. The flower stall in the old wooden ticket booth caught my eye; such bright colours, untypical of the location and season. The effort the lady who runs it puts into her displays is admirable, and always joyous.

I adore Moor Street Station. It’s probably the best station I use, and it’s a credit to the staff that work there.