GWR Route: Banbury to Wolverhampton

Soho and Winson Green: gwrswg1562b

Close up of Soho and Winson Green station's main lines and associated platform buildings. The platforms had a corbelled brick edge with large overhanging edging stones (4ft x 2ft 6in x 3in deep). The rest of the platform surface appears to be tarmacadam or loose gravel. Similarly to the island platform buildings, the up main platform buildings are believed to contain a general waiting room, ladies waiting room and gentlemen’s toilets. The latter’s entrance is behind the two tone painted wooden screen at the ends nearest to the photographer. As a general rule any raised framing was finished in dark stone (Standard Tint No.3) and panelling in mid stone (Standard Tint No.2). This policy can be seen to have been applied both to the toilet screen and the canopy woodwork, where mid stone has been used on the vertical planking and valance, while the triangular framing on the canopy end is painted in dark stone.

Above these wide station platform canopies with their saw-tooth valances can be seen the tiled roof and rear elevation of the main entrance and booking office on Benson Road bridge. This stood at the end of the up main platform adjacent to the footbridge. The British Railways (Western Region) station totems on the lamp columns have been painted over to show just ‘Winson Green’ following the station name change on 14th June 1965. The standard colouring scheme even extended to the lamp columns whose base is dark stone and the upper parts mid stone.

Robert Ferris

back