Alvechurch Station

London North Western Railway:

Midland Railway:

Stratford Midland Junction Railway

The Shakespeare Route

Alvechurch Station (Worcestershire)

The line from Barnt Green to Redditch was opened for passengers on 19th September 1859 and for goods traffic on 1st October 1859. Alvechurch Station was opened a few weeks later on 1st November 1859. The station was built on a 1 in 74 falling gradient which should have meant that access to the single siding, which accommodated ten wagons, was from the opposite end to that constructed. The reason being that the Board of Trade (the government department responsible for railways) normally insists that the locomotive is at the lower end to prevent break away wagons. Bob Essery suggests that it is likely the railway was built prior to this ruling becoming a statutory requirement. This led to the primitive method of shunting with a tow rope being employed for trains travelling in the up direction. Wagons required to be placed in the siding from up trains were attached to a tow rope sufficiently long to allow the locomotive to pass through the points and stop so the points could be reset to allow the wagons to enter the siding. The locomotive pulling the wagons forward on the parallel siding. As Bob Essery comments 'It was a dangerous practice and men could be injured if the rope broke under the strain. During Bob Essery's time on the line the simple practice of taking wagons to Redditch for traffic destined north of Barnt Green was employed whilst traffic required to go south was taken to Barnt Green.

The station became part of the London, Midland and Scottish Railway during the 1923 railway grouping. Under the 1948 transport nationalisation it became part of the London Midland Region of British Railways. Passenger services beyond Redditch ended in October 1962 and the line closed completely in July 1964 - the remainder of the route (including the station here) was threatened with closure following the publication of the Beeching Report in 1963 but subsequently reprieved (albeit with a much reduced level of service - just four trains per day each way from the mid-1960s onwards) to serve the planned Redditch New town development announced in 1964.