GWR Route: Banbury to Wolverhampton

Acocks Green & South Yardley Station: gwrag2450

Ex-GWR 4-6-0 4073 Class No 5033 'Broughton Castle' passes south with the diverted Pines Express on 10th September 1962. The 1962 Winter timetable saw the Pines Express being diverted from its old route via the Somerset & Dorset line and No 5033 is seen on the inaugural service. Built by Swindon works to Lot 296 in May 1935, No 5033 was to remain in service until September 1962 when it was withdrawn from 81F Oxford shed to be scrapped by J Cashmore of Great Bridge. The Pines Express was a passenger service which originally ran unnamed until 26th September 1927 when the marketing department named the service to generate publicity. which ran daily between Manchester and Bournemouth between 1910 and 1967. It is believed to have been named after the pine trees growing in the Chines in the Bournemouth area. When the service first ran, unnamed, on 1 October 1910, it was a joint Midland Railway and London North Western Railway initiative and was introduced in response to a similar London South Western Railway and Great Western Railway service between Birkenhead and Bournemouth. The last Pines Express to run over the Somerset & Dorset Joint Railway was on 8th September 1962 and was hauled by British Railways 2-10-0 Standard Class 9F No 92220 'Evening Star'. The train was then diverted over ex-GWR metals via Oxford, Reading, Basingstoke and Southampton. In 1964 a Pines Express service was the last passenger service worked over the Didcot, Newbury and Southampton Railway before the line closed to all traffic between 1965 and 1967. From 4th October 1965 the service was extended to Poole, but the last train was run on 4th March 1967.

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