Blake Street railway station serves the

Hill Hook Hill Hook is an area of Sutton Coldfield, Birmingham, England. The area includes Hill Hook Local Nature Reserve, declared in 2003 with an area of 5.65 hectares, which is on the site of a watermill built in the 17th century. An earlier dam showed ...

area of

Sutton Coldfield Sutton Coldfield or the Royal Town of Sutton Coldfield, known locally as Sutton ( ), is a town and civil parish in the City of Birmingham, West Midlands, England. The town lies around 8 miles northeast of Birmingham city centre, 9 miles south ...

, Birmingham,

England England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...

. It is situated on the

Cross-City Line The Cross-City Line is a commuter rail line in the West Midlands region of England. It runs for from Redditch and Bromsgrove in Worcestershire, its two southern termini, to Lichfield, Staffordshire, its northern terminus, via Birmingham New Str ...

, located on the county boundary between the

West Midlands West or Occident is one of the four cardinal directions or points of the compass. It is the opposite direction from east and is the direction in which the Sun sets on the Earth. Etymology The word "west" is a Germanic word passed into some ...

and

Staffordshire Staffordshire (; postal abbreviation Staffs.) is a landlocked county in the West Midlands region of England. It borders Cheshire to the northwest, Derbyshire and Leicestershire to the east, Warwickshire to the southeast, the West Midlands Cou ...

. The station is managed by

West Midlands Trains West Midlands Trains (WMT) is a train operating company in the United Kingdom. It operates passenger trains on the West Midlands franchise between London and the English Midlands under two trade names: West Midlands Railway (WMR) (within the ...

, who operate all trains serving it.

History

The station opened in 1884, when the

London and North Western Railway The London and North Western Railway (LNWR, L&NWR) was a British railway company between 1846 and 1922. In the late 19th century, the L&NWR was the largest joint stock company in the United Kingdom. In 1923, it became a constituent of the Lo ...

extended their

Birmingham Birmingham ( ) is a city and metropolitan borough in the metropolitan county of West Midlands in England. It is the second-largest city in the United Kingdom with a population of 1.145 million in the city proper, 2.92 million in the West ...

to Sutton Coldfield line northward to

Lichfield Lichfield () is a cathedral city and civil parish in Staffordshire, England. Lichfield is situated roughly south-east of the county town of Stafford, south-east of Rugeley, north-east of Walsall, north-west of Tamworth and south-west of B ...

. In May 1978, Blake Street became one of the stations on the Cross-City Line, launched by the West Midlands PTE to link the Lichfield branch with the infrequently served suburban line to and Redditch. The northern end was subsequently extended to Lichfield Trent Valley in 1988 and electrified on the 25 kV AC system in 1992. The signalling at the station is set up so that trains can terminate or start from here, but the facility is only rarely used in the current (May 2018) timetable (just one each way Monday-Saturday).

Facilities

The station has a staffed ticket office on the southbound side at street level, staffed on a part-time basis. A self-service ticket machine (located next to the booking office) is also available for use when the office is closed. At platform level, there is a waiting shelter on the northbound side and a waiting room on the southbound platform. CIS displays, timetable posters, customer help points and automated announcements provide train running information. Step-free access to both platforms is available via ramps from street level.

Services

The station is served by

with local

Transport for West Midlands Transport for West Midlands (TfWM) is the public body responsible for co-ordinating transport services in the West Midlands metropolitan county in England. It is an executive body of the West Midlands Combined Authority (WMCA), with bus franch ...

branded "Cross-City" services, operated by

Class 323 The British Rail Class 323 are electric multiple unit (EMU) passenger trains built by Hunslet Transportation Projects and Holec. All 43 units were built from 1992 through to 1995, although mock-ups and prototypes were built and tested in 1990 ...

electrical multiple unit An electric multiple unit or EMU is a multiple-unit train consisting of self-propelled carriages using electricity as the motive power. An EMU requires no separate locomotive, as electric traction motors are incorporated within one or a number ...

s with an average journey time to

Birmingham New Street Birmingham New Street is the largest and busiest of the Birmingham station group, three main railway stations in Birmingham city centre, England, and a central hub of the Rail transport in the United Kingdom, British railway system. It is a ma ...

of around 29 minutes. On Mondays to Saturdays, two trains per operate southbound; to

Bromsgrove Bromsgrove is a town in Worcestershire, England, about northeast of Worcester and southwest of Birmingham city centre. It had a population of 29,237 in 2001 (39,644 in the wider Bromsgrove/Catshill urban area). Bromsgrove is the main town in the ...

via Longbridge. Northbound there are also two trains per hour, to Lichfield Trent Valley. On Sundays, trains run every 30 minutes between Lichfield Trent Valley and Redditch.

References

External links

Rail Around Birmingham and the West Midlands: Blake Street station
Sutton Coldfield Railway stations in Birmingham, West Midlands DfT Category E stations Former London and North Western Railway stations Railway stations in Great Britain opened in 1884 Railway stations served by West Midlands Trains {{WestMidlands-railstation-stub