History
Smethwick Junction railway station was opened by the Great Western Railway in 1867. It was located on the Great Western Railway line running between Smethwick Junction and Stourbridge Junction station. The junction connected the Great Western route to the Stour Valley Line, which is now part of the West Coast route. In 1956 the British Transport Commission renamed the station to Smethwick West.
With the run down of Birmingham Snow Hill, passenger services were diverted to Birmingham New Street from 1967; and Smethwick West became a station on the route between Birmingham New Street, Stourbridge Junction and Worcester Foregate Street.
Reduced levels of local services continued from Snow Hill to Wolverhampton Low Level; with four trains per day from Snow Hill to Langley Green, via Smethwick West, using Class 122 units, nicknamed "bubble cars". These services ended in March 1972; and the Great Western route to Birmingham Snow Hill also closed in 1972. A single freight-only line to Coopers Scrap Yard, on the Great Western line in Handsworth was kept in use.
The route to Snow Hill was restored in 1995.
Read more about this topic: Smethwick West Railway Station
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“My good friends, this is the second time in our history that there has come back from Germany to Downing Street peace with honour. I believe it is peace for our time. We thank you from the bottom of our hearts. And now I recommend you to go home and sleep quietly in your beds.”
—Neville Chamberlain (1869–1940)
“History is the present. That’s why every generation writes it anew. But what most people think of as history is its end product, myth.”
—E.L. (Edgar Lawrence)
“[Men say:] “Don’t you know that we are your natural protectors?” But what is a woman afraid of on a lonely road after dark? The bears and wolves are all gone; there is nothing to be afraid of now but our natural protectors.”
—Frances A. Griffin, U.S. suffragist. As quoted in History of Woman Suffrage, vol. 4, ch. 19, by Susan B. Anthony and Ida Husted Harper (1902)