Alstom Anxious : Hitachi Hopeful (1)

Railway modellers, train enthusiasts and maybe a few normal people will recognise the venerable Class 101 diesel train seem in all quarters of the British mainland. They were made by …

… Metro Cammell at Birmingham.  Historically, they built the Brighton Belle trains.

The company had premises at Saltley, but the main site was at Washwood Heath. Actually, if you are to believe Google Maps it wasn’t at Washwood Heath!

But Google Maps and Google Earth do show a huge scorched earth site just to the west of the northern end of Washwood Heath.

This is to be the mega depot for HS2 which, if Rishi and Keir have their evil way, won’t actually need all of it!

Here is a view of the actual MetCam depot …

… and here is part of the aerial view spun round to match the works picture’s orientation.

The circular “holes” where once stood the two gas holders will help our readers’ geographical orientation – or even help them know where they are! Further help comes from Open Street Map.

Gas holder imprint is middle left! The road alongside the depot is Warren Road.

Leigh Primary School stands sentinel to one of the Metro Cammell entrance gates as was!

For a while he company was known as Metro Cammell Weyman and was also a manufacturer of buses …

… notably the MCW Metrobus.

Washwood Heath was also a major supplier of trains for London Underground.

The company built the Blue Pullmans …

… a whole heap of Networkers …

… and the Adelantes

These are now with Grand Central.

But Metro also once made much humbler train vehicles as here …

… with the Presflo cement and salt wagons.

The last trains completed before the site closed in 2005 were the Pendolinos (Pendolini?) for the West Coast main line.

Way back in 1989 the business had been sold to GEC Alsthom before it lost its “h” to become plain Alstom.

It is also worth noting that Metro Cammell exported trains to other far flung parts of the globe as here for the Hong Kong Metro.

As a somewhat smaller project the two original MAGLEV cars for Birmingham Airport were built by MetCam just along the road.

Clearly the closure of Metro Cammell was a huge blow to Birmingham’s economy – nay, the nation’s economy – but is the same thing happening all over again?

More tomorrow.

 Next Anxious and Hopeful blog : Friday 6th Sept