Great World Wide Rail Almanac IV: Stratford

Haha gotcha, I’m not doing either of the Birmingham stations after all; because it turns out there are actually 3 stations in Birmingham centre. And I’d be amiss not to make it a three-parter. I’ll have to wait until I’m next in Brum to pick up some photos, although I hope it isn’t too far out; Birmingham has a safe zone of only 1 mile radius about Vicky Square before you get to the no-go zone.

Instead, I’ll be doing another Warwickshire classic, Stratford station. Stratford station is located in Stratford. Not the one in London, the one upon the Avon you fuck. Whenever people make that mistake I actually want to stab them to death with a sharpened Elizabethan quill.

“When beggars die, there are no comets seen.”

Thanks Shakey, always a big help. You’re always there for me.

“Friendship is constant in all things. Save in the office and affairs of love.”

Well I guess I’m going all “Et tu, Brute” on your ass coz I freaking LOVE Stratford. Stratford is my country. I guess it’s also yours but that’s besides the point. I wish I could tell you how Stratford is the Dark Souls of middle England mediaeval towns, but this is the great world wide rail almanac and I have a duty to almanac the great railways world-wide. And so, unfortunately, I should limit this to just the station. Here’s a photo:

I actually really like what they’ve done to the station facade recently. They’ve opened up a huge area out the front and redone all the paving, giving it this snazzy old-new look; almost like its a museum exhibition, when in reality its just fucking old and needs replacing. Clever. Thinking about it, isn’t that just what this entire country is? We try to keep everything clean and spanking, but maybe what we truly need is a complete restructure of the system. Interesting, I’ll put “overthrow the government” on my stack of things to do.

You see the black gate that looks like the entrance? It’s not. As far as I can tell its purely ornamental. Although “ornate” is a weird way to phrase it, it being covered in graffiti and all. Here’s a close-up:

Okay. I’ll admit that it does look like a weak attempt at inner city nu-age artsy graffiti. Cut some slack guys, most people in Stratford actually have real jobs to attend to. If you think that these photos are lower quality than usual that’s because they are, it wasn’t me took them. I outsourced this job to my secretary. And apparently the camera on my secretary’s phone is like 200% shittier quality than mine, and mine isn’t even fancy. To break up this section here’s a photo of the actual platform:

I’m glad I already said these photos aren’t mine, I wouldn’t be seen dead taking a vertical photograph; that’s what I get for outsourcing my work. I need a new secretary. Or maybe I should just stop being lazy.

Here’s a story I just remembered that happened at Stratford station. It was around 5 years ago and I was hanging out around Stratford on a Wednesday afternoon skipping PE, like all good kids do. One thing led to another, and eventually we were setting of a homemade firework on the wall outside the station. Why? Because it’d be funny. It was. Very. It broke a little bit of the wall off and it stayed like that for a good few years before they did the refurbishments a year or so back. Good times. One day I’ll tell some more stories about our extra curricula chemistry research, but assured to say they weren’t all crackers, some of them were pipe bombs.

Stratford is a sparsely used station, being the termination point of a line that only runs Stratford-New Street. It’s just a nice, quiet (usually) station that’s fun for all the family. I saw a steam train there once too; wholesome stuff. What d’you say Billy?

“Good.”

Thanks Billy.

PS - There's a new index page for the GWWRA, along with a never-before-seen Forward chapter!

Great World Wide Rail Almanac III: Nottingham

Hey look at the time, it's tomorrow already. Time for Nottingham! What's that? It's been a month? Well check your privilege nerd, some of us don't have the luxury of 24 hours every day. Sheesh. Saying that, it has now been quite a while since I actually went on that journey that included Nottingham station. In fact, I've already been on a different train adventure since then, but since I live here now, it's not surprising Nottingham came up again. Here's a photo of the platform. Platform 3a to be precise:

But who cares. It's not a remarkable platform. None of them were. I checked. Since I mentioned it earlier, now is a good a time as ever to spill the beans on the story of the first trip that will serve as inspiration for the first entries into this here almighty almanac. I was back to Nottingham university from my home near Dorridge, thus Dorridge was my first station. It wasn't a single journey oh no. First I took the Chiltern Line from Dorridge to Birmingham Moor Street, walked over to Grand Central New Street (popping into both Costa and Waterstones on the way) and then got the wrong train, kind of. You see New street station's platforms are split into A and B each, and evidently I got the wrong one, because I ended up on a train that did in fact go to Nottingham, but via Derby. So I ended up stuck in Derby station for an hour and a half. That's when I thought to myself; “you know what, this is a shite station isn't it. Dorridge is much better. I bet nobody could come to that conclusion by themselves; as the administrator of a successful and influential internet text blog, I have a duty to tell the lowly plebeians about the quality of these two stations. In fact, why not all the train stations. Yes I must take up this mantle. I must fulfil my duty as the direct ancestor of Mr T. Station, inventor of the train station. My destiny awaits me.”

And so I made this, the comprehensive great grand almanac of train stations by me, [name redacted]. Hope you like it. Remember to fucking like, comment and suicide. Donate to my Patreon at http://bit.ly/2ARsMxE. Kill me baby. Kill your baby. Kill god and steal his throne. Die in a hole, hole in one, one for all, all for me. Thank you.

Nottingham stations pretty decent actually. It has a fucky mix of old and new, with the framework of the old station still standing, but this time they actually gave it a roof. Like wtf, did it just not have one before. Here, look at this photo of the main lobby:

Did Victorians just like to be rained on then? And they were meant to be good at inventing stuff. Here's a different pleasing photo I took:

I call it, symmetrical ATMs on both sides of the clock tower entrance. There are symmetrical ATMs on both sides of the entrance under the clock tower. This way two individuals can withdraw cash simultaneously. But yet, there is not even a single person doing that. What does it mean? Very deep. A commentary on society's gradual disengagement and awakening to the true nature of the world in which they live? A satirical mocking of modern corporations' seemingly constant unashamed advertising, patronising its customers to no end? Or maybe they were both out-of-order? Who knows. I know. They weren't. The photo probably would've been better if those people weren't standing in shot. What was I going to do though? Ask them to move out the way? That's ridiculous. I'm British.

One cool aspect about Nottingham station is that it's directly connected into the city tram line. As in you can climb some stairs onto a ramp way that goes over the top of the rails, and straight to the tram stop. It's actually pretty cool. Now I'm a bumpkin so this is about as close as I've ever felt to being a city boy. Trams? What is this, freaking Coruscant? If God had intended us to take trams everywhere he would've given us built in oyster cards instead of legs. Ooah I'm pleased with that gag. Yes, very good. Here's a shot from on top of the tram ramp, looking across the entire station complex:

Well at the time I thought that this was a really good photo, I was well chuffed; but now I'm looking at it again, it just isn't. It's blurry, there's no real focus, there are weird light reflections all over the place. Hmm not my finest work. I'll blame the shitty camera lens. It would've been perfect if I'd had my proper snapper. I would try to explain what's in this photo but honestly I'm not sure. I've never been to the area the other side of the station, but I assume that pointy tower is some kind of church? And the chimney is presumably connected to some industrial thingy. Your guess is as good as mine.

I rate Nottingham good. Robin hood would be pleased. Except he didn't really live here, he lived a good 25 miles North in Sherwood, but antidigressionally I can say he'd really like it here. Yeah, you should come here. Nottingham as a city is really nice too. Although don't hype yourself up too much for the castle, think soggy-bottomed fried bread rather than a full English breakfast. Also it's just called fried bread, not French toast goddamnit. Screw the Frenchies, 1415 for life.

Here's a poll that you're not allowed to vote on, should I do Birmingham Moor Street or Birmingham New Street next? I don't care what you think. Democracy's for yellow bellies and cuckolds. Maybe I'll do a double station spectacular! Maybe this time it won't take me a whole month! Find out next time in: The Grandiose Expeditionary Stori of Iklone the Wise in a Cautionary Tale: Great Railways and Where to Find Them, the Almanac!