Old Moor Street Station

Old Moor Street Station

Railway station and warehouses built between 1911 and 1916. The station was designed by W.Y. Armstrong, Great Western Railway engineer for New Works. The warehouses were designed by L.G. Mouchel and constructed using the Hennebique ferroconcrete system.

The station buildings are constructed in red brick, partly with terracotta facing and stone dressings. The roofs are mostly steel and glazed, though some are flat behind parapets and not visible from ground level. The architecture is in a restrained Baroque style.

The street frontage consists of a single-storey six-window entrance range. The windows are large with wooden mullion-transom arches and glazing bars. The brick heads are gauged with rounded arches, keystones and moulded hoods. The facade features a plinth, pilasters, a moulded impost band and cornice with parapet. The parapet is raised on bays one, three and five; bay three has a segmental head. The entrance is positioned as the fifth bay from the left with a flat head. Front railings with a decorative standard are placed at the centre and left. Five curved stone-coped main roof gables are set back above the front parapet, each with a roundel. Various brick stacks are distributed across the elevation. The right-hand return has four bays with arch-headed openings with keyed heads, each bay treated differently and separated by pilasters. A continuous moulded cornice and parapet runs along this elevation. The rear elevation reveals the five gables of the concourse roof and two projecting canopies over the platforms.

The interior entrance leads to a flagged covered area with offices on two sides featuring similar arched keyed-head windows. The platforms lie beyond, accessed through steel barrier gates with cast iron elements. Steel piers support the platforms, which have long steel strutted and glazed roofs spanning five bays. Near the buffer end are the remains of two transverses, a rare device used to transfer locomotives between lines. To the right of the main building is a small weigh office and further right a two-storey office in poor condition, both in similar architectural style.

The warehouses are positioned to the right of and partly beneath the station, extending to Allison Street and traversed by Park Street. The ground-floor level contains two immense warehouses constructed in reinforced ferroconcrete to the Hennebique system. Shed A, between Moor Street and Park Street, measures approximately 100 metres by 50 to 70 metres and is supported by multiple concrete piers carrying a concrete beam and roof system. Above this is a cobbled yard, now used as a car park but formerly containing extensive open iron and boarded warehouses. This shed contains a weigh office with its complete mechanism displayed outside, a raised platform system for unloading, and the remains of housings for two wagon hoists used to transfer goods wagons between levels. Shed B, at a slightly lower level between Park Street and Allison Street, measures approximately 100 metres by 65 to 80 metres and has similar construction with a series of brick arches to one side resembling a viaduct, slightly earlier than the warehouses and supporting the station lines and platforms. The remains of housings for two wagon hoists span Park Street across the full width of the sheds. A steel and brick bridge-like roof spans the entire width.

History: Moor Street Station was originally intended for passenger traffic only, but the opportunity arose to construct a large goods depot alongside it. The station first opened on 1 July 1906 with temporary buildings to serve traffic on the Stratford-on-Avon line, which could not run into Snow Hill station due to being at the wrong end of the tunnel. The permanent station buildings and warehouses were constructed together between 1911 and 1916. Armstrong was one of the first British engineers to employ the Hennebique system of construction, which was promoted in Britain by Mouchel under licence from Hennebique. The ambitious conception of warehouses with station above was made possible by the sloping terrain rising from Allison Street to Moor Street. The station closed in September 1987 when it was replaced by a new station on an adjacent site.