LMS: Birmingham New Street to Tamworth

Kingsbury Branch Sidings: mrk1121

Looking towards Birmingham with the yet to be commissioned Shunting Frame seen on the right on 9th August 1969. Whilst Saltley Power Signal Box became responsible for the main line controlled by Kingsbury Sidings' manual signal box in September 1969, the Shunting Frame took over the responsibility of controlling the sidings to the two Collieries and also to Cohen's Scrapyard. The semaphore signals seen above were Midland Railway lower quadrant signals, a little bit of a miracle that they were still standing in 1969. These too were redundant and were swept away in September 1969 when Saltley Power Box came on line. The opening of Saltley Power Box was the inspiration for Bill Wright (Barking Bill of Flickr) to capture as many of the boxes as they could over a couple of weekends before they all disappeared. Bill writes' It was a great pity we didn't think to do it earlier with the LNWR boxes as well when the lines were electrified.

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