Birmingham PSB tour 31/3

[Tallguy]

Anyone else on here manage to get tickets for the Birmingham PSB tour? I did

 

[Sniffingmoose]

I applied but was not successful. They said in their email to me that they had more than 7,500 applications for the 60 places on the tours so you would be very lucky to get a tour.

 

[TJM]

Guess I was very lucky then, as I have one! For a description of what it entails, from the email Network Rail sent me:

After signing at the entrance the tour will start promptly on the hour and move up to floor 4, where you will be shown the signalling simulator with examples of lever signals - the technology used when the Victorians built the railway nearly 200 years ago.

This demonstrates the manual way traditional signal boxes set points for trains to move from track to track and show the appropriate signals for them to safely make their journey.

The next portion of the tour moves up to floor 5 which was the relay room - the heart of the Birmingham power signal box when it was operational.

This 1960s technology - effectively a huge telephone exchange - controlled the movement of trains through Britain's busiest station outside of London continuously up until 24 December 2022.

Then the final part of the tour will take attendees up to floor 6 and to the signalling panel, where signallers would be the brains for the trains and set their paths on the board, which would then go through the equipment you'd have just seen in the relay room and through more cables directly linked with the signals, points and tracks in the station beyond.

Signallers with decades of experience will explain what it was like to work on the panel, and the tour will finish with a Q and A session with them. In total the tour will last 45 minutes.

 

[jfollows]

Anyone else on here manage to get tickets for the Birmingham PSB tour? I did

Well done!
I also applied and failed. Oh well!

 

[Tallguy]

Sadly I have a mate going with me so can’t offer the ticket to a forum member. I am just really pleased to have got 2 tickets. Once in a lifetime chance. Hopefully the old equipment may be donated to a museum such as York.

 

[The Planner]

Sadly I have a mate going with me so can’t offer the ticket to a forum member. I am just really pleased to have got 2 tickets. Once in a lifetime chance. Hopefully the old equipment may be donated to a museum such as York.

Its just a NX panel? There isnt anything that special about it, its more the building.

 

[birchesgreen]

I was unsuccessful but i think i might have given them my old mobile number (which i often do by accident) so if they had tried to contact me it would have been in vain.