page_title: Smethwick
section_title: Transport history
hierarchical_section_title: Smethwick / History / Transport history
caption_attribution_description: English: The Hawthorns Station This was originally part of the Great Western Railway's main line between Birmingham and Wolverhampton, opened in 1854. In 1931, 31 years after the opening of West Bromwich Albion's stadium a few yards up the road, the GWR opened a halt, partly on the site pictured here, which was used only on match days. The Hawthorns Halt closed in 1968, although a fairly skeletal passenger service continued to pass this way until 1972 when trains between Birmingham Snow Hill, Wolverhampton Low Level and Langley Green were withdrawn. The line remained open for the occasional freight train to a scrapyard at Handsworth, but it looked as though this grand old route had effectively disappeared for ever. All that changed in 1995, when the line was reopened for a completely new service connecting a reopened Snow Hill and the Kidderminster line; this was partly intended to relieve congestion at New Street station. This time The Hawthorns was a fully fledged station with a regular service. In 1999 the Midland Metro opened providing a tram service between Birmingham and Wolverhampton mainly following the old Great Western line; the tram stop can be seen in the foreground. Passengers therefore now have the choice of tram or train to travel from here into central Birmingham.
context_page_description: Smethwick is an industrial town in Sandwell, West Midlands, historically in Staffordshire. It is 4 miles west of Birmingham city centre and borders West Bromwich and Oldbury to the north and west. Formerly a Staffordshire county borough, Smethwick is situated near the edge of Sandwell metropolitan borough and borders the Birmingham districts of Handsworth, Winson Green, Harborne, Edgbaston and Quinton to the south and east, as well as the Black Country towns of West Bromwich and Oldbury in the north and west.
context_section_description: Canals
  See also: BCN Main Line
  Smethwick has a long association with canals, which were the town's first major transport links from a time before decent roads and of course railways. The Birmingham Canal Navigation Old and New Main Line Canals run through the industrial areas and right past the High Street, running parallel to the Stour Valley Railway Line: all three end up in Wolverhampton. James Brindley was the engineer charged with building the canal, a man who gives his name to the busy district in the centre of Birmingham near the International Convention Centre, National Indoor Arena and Broad Street.
  The old main line was completed through Smethwick by 1769. It required 12 locks to climb over the hill through the town; Brindley had found the earth too soft to dig a cutting through at the time. Water was supplied by two steam engines. One of them was located on the Engine Arm which led to the Smethwick Engine on Rabone Lane and the other was near Spon Lane. New Smethwick Pumping Station next to Brasshouse Lane was added later in 1892. Because of the locks, the canal through Smethwick became a bottleneck and Thomas Telford was commissioned in 1824 to look at alternatives.
  The new main line through Smethwick was completed by 1829 and completely bypassed all 6 remaining locks of the summit with a deep cutting. The Engine Arm and Stewarts aqueducts were built to carry their respective canals over the new mainline. The cutting was built through the land of the local businessman Samuel Galton and thus this cutting created the Galton Valley and Galton Bridge was named in his honour. The bridge was the longest single-span iron bridge in the world at the time. The canals of the new and old main line diverged at one end at Smethwick Junction near Bridge Street and rejoined at Bromford Junction near Bromford Road in Oldbury.
  Today Galton Valley is a nature area and of more historical interest than commercial, and used mainly for leisure rather than transporting commercial goods.
  Railways
  The LNWR was the first to construct a railway through Smethwick in 1852 from New Street towards Wolverhampton and the North West, Rolfe Street and Spon Lane opened that year followed by Soho in 1853. In 1867 the Stourbridge Railway opened a link between the Great Western Birmingham, Wolverhampton & Dudley Railway (of 1852) near the current Hawthorns and Stourbridge with a station at Smethwick West and a link to the Stour Valley line towards New Street called Smethwick Junction, the Stourbridge Railway was merged into the Great Western in 1870. It was not until 1931 that a railway station was constructed at the Hawthorns, although it was a 'Halt' primarily for football ground, this station closed in 1967.
  From 1854 the Birmingham Railway Carriage & Wagon Company was based in Smethwick until its closure in 1963. The company not only built trains, but also London Underground stock, buses and a military equipment.
  Soho railway station closed in 1949, followed by Spon Lane in 1968. beginning the first of several rail closures in the town. In 1972 the section of line between Smethwick West and Birmingham Moor Street, as well as the Birmingham, Wolverhampton and Dudley railway, was closed with the exception of a single line between Smethwick West and Coopers Scrap Metal in Handsworth and all Stourbridge services were diverted into Birmingham New Street. In 1995 the line between Birmingham Snow Hill and Smethwick West was restored and a new station called Smethwick Galton Bridge was constructed over both the Snow Hill and Stour Valley lines to provide an interchange. Smethwick West was due to close when Galton Bridge opened, but due to a legal error British Railways had to maintain a parliamentary train service to the station. Most local trains from Stourbridge to Birmingham were diverted into Snow Hill although it was not until 2004 that the last regular service used the route into Birmingham New Street via Smethwick Junction.
  Soho TMD is located next to Soho rail junction, road access is just of Wellington Street. It is the principle train depot f
caption: The Hawthorns railway station and metro stop
exif: {"Image ImageDescription": "THE HAWTHORNS STATION", "Image Make": "PENTAX Corporation", "Image Model": "PENTAX K10D", "Image XResolution": "107", "Image YResolution": "107", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "GIMP 2.8.6", "Image DateTime": "2013:10:28 16:52:56", "Image YCbCrPositioning": "Co-sited", "Image ExifOffset": "606", "Image PrintIM": "[80, 114, 105, 110, 116, 73, 77, 0, 48, 51, 48, 48, 0, 0, 0, 33, 0, 1, 0, 22, ... ]", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "2396", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "6780", "EXIF ExposureTime": "1/90", "EXIF FNumber": "67/10", "EXIF ExposureProgram": "Shutter Priority", "EXIF ISOSpeedRatings": "100", "EXIF ExifVersion": "0221", "EXIF DateTimeOriginal": "2009:06:20 16:04:37", "EXIF DateTimeDigitized": "2009:06:20 16:04:37", "EXIF ComponentsConfiguration": "YCbCr", "EXIF ExposureBiasValue": "0", "EXIF MeteringMode": "Pattern", "EXIF Flash": "Flash did not fire, compulsory flash mode", "EXIF FocalLength": "55", "EXIF FlashPixVersion": "0100", "EXIF ColorSpace": "sRGB", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "1000", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "669", "Interoperability InteroperabilityIndex": "R98", "Interoperability InteroperabilityVersion": "[48, 49, 48, 48]", "EXIF InteroperabilityOffset": "2272", "EXIF SensingMethod": "One-chip color area", "EXIF FileSource": "Digital Camera", "EXIF SceneType": "Directly Photographed", "EXIF CustomRendered": "Custom", "EXIF ExposureMode": "Auto Exposure", "EXIF WhiteBalance": "Auto", "EXIF FocalLengthIn35mmFilm": "82", "EXIF SceneCaptureType": "Standard", "EXIF Contrast": "Normal", "EXIF Saturation": "Normal", "EXIF Sharpness": "Normal", "EXIF SubjectDistanceRange": "3"}