GWR Route: Banbury to Wolverhampton

GWR Route: North Warwickshire Line

Birmingham Snow Hill Station: gwrbsh1802

This photograph appeared in the October 1922 issue of the Great Western Railway Magazine (Volume XXXIV, No10). The chalk script and map were recorded as being the work of Snow Hill Station Porter: Mr R White. At the time the company had just completed their bi-annual revision of the passenger timetable, which was issued on 2nd October. This new winter train service announced - an increase in the provision for more expeditious travel between large centres of commerce, while trains designed to purely meet the requirements of the summer holiday traffic would disappear.

Cross-country express services were being retained, especially those that connected widely separate places without need for a change of carriage and several services which involved through working over other Railway Companies lines were being promoted. Amongst these was the Birkenhead to South East Coast Ports (Margate / Ramsgate, Dover / Folkestone, Hastings and Brighton) service, which ran via the Midlands. This transferred to Southern Railway metals at Reading and then split into three separate trains at Redhill, one of which split again at Ashford. This was a daily service (Monday to Saturday), which operated in both directions, so required two sets of carriage stock. The Great Western Railway and Southern Railway both provided one set of carriage stock each, including a restaurant car in the Margate portion. As a result the stock alternated daily, each set working in opposite directions and making the reverse journey on the following day.

Robert Ferris

back

back to Snow Hill photos