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I have been looking at this line on Google Maps and I noticed that the line passes the Royal Mail depot in Sutton Coldfield. I know from visiting that place several times that there is a disused railway station there. Is this included in the list of stations? If not, is there a reason why it isn't? Thanks - Erebus555 12:20, 3 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]

Is it Sutton Park? – Tivedshambo (talk) 13:41, 3 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I doubt it because it is quite a distance from Sutton Park. Also, the station is not a passenger station by the looks of it. There are two or three loading bays on the side opposite the tracks. - Erebus555 13:58, 3 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
See this website. The Royal Mail terminal is on the site of the Sutton Park station goods shed.  – Tivedshambo (talk) 17:02, 3 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
I stand corrected :-). Just seems like an odd place to put the Sutton Park station when it actually isn't in Sutton Park. But then again, the Royal Mail depot is new so it is possible that the park did extend that far in the past. Thanks! - Erebus555 17:37, 3 April 2007 (UTC)[reply]
Er, but it IS in the Park, though? Or if it isn't, it's as close to the Park as it's possible to get without actually crossing the boundary (perhaps there was some kind of local regulation against building it within the park boundary, even if the line goes through it?). The dirt track at the end of Midland Drive (off Anchorage Road) runs alongside the station remnants and the track itself for a couple hundred metres, and when you go through the gate at the end of said track, you're in the Park, emerging onto an internal road at the point where it crosses a bridge over the tracks. Even if it's not actually "inside", it's splitting hairs to say you can't call it by that name when it's built literally right next to its namesake, for the fully achieved purpose of granting rapid pedestrian access to the same. "Chester Road" station on the nearby Cross-City Line would, under the same scheme, be more properly called Green Lanes, and who knows what you'd do about Erdington (10 minutes walk from the town centre) or Gravelly Hill further down those tracks. (Source: having ridden my bicycle down said dirt track a good many times whilst at a nearby school in the 90s ... maybe it's not so visible now after the more recent demolitions, but it was at the time!) 146.90.199.209 (talk) 18:24, 24 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

re-opening

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The line is surely open. The so-called re-opening would actually be about:

Prior quad tracking?

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Living as I do in a property that overlooks part of this line, a recent bit of musing whilst looking out of the window led me to realise something I should have done many months ago, if not longer... the bridges around Walmley are "too wide"! The ones carrying Penns Lane, Eachelhurst Road and a couple of other minor routes have two double-track-width portals, vs others along the line (as shown by aerial views on Google Maps and similar) having only single portals. The line in each case runs only through the more northerly of the two. The aerial views, and indeed what I can see out of my window, suggest that at some point the ground was at least prepared for the laying of additional Permanent Way, although it either never happened, or it has been lifted a long time since.

This only seems to be the case for a certain distance either side of Penns station - by the time the line passes the nearby "water park" nature reserve to the southeast, or starts to pass through New Hall Valley to the northwest, it has definitely returned to being plain double-track - the embankments/cuttings, bridges etc are only wide enough for that and there's no sign it was ever different.

I guess, therefore, that given the line's mixed use, the station had some kind of passing loop arrangement - presumably the passenger trains travelled along the outermost rails (diverting two lines to the left from the double-track when heading north, or staying on the same line when heading south), and allowed freight trains to pass through the middle pair (diverted one left heading north, one right heading south)? Or even the freights stopped in the middle whilst faster, more easily stop-started passenger trains undertook them on the outside. The potential length of loop is long enough that a not-too-excessive freight train could fit within the diverge/merge points, and a local passenger service could even be overtaken by an express without having to particularly extend its waiting time at the station, but you couldn't realistically have one train in motion overtaking another.

That, or it's actually just ancient sidings, and they ended at buffers up-against the end of the platform in both cases.

Does anyone know what the true history of this piece of track would be in this regard? My only real recourse other than asking here is to go hunt out old maps (...or old low-altitude aerial photos?!) that _might_ show it (if they don't just show the tracks as a single thick black-and-white line that is). If nothing else, it'd make me a bit more grateful, next time some heavily loaded rake of aggregate wagons thunders past, literally making everything in the room shake even on the other side of the building, that they are at least not 10 metres closer still... 146.90.199.209 (talk) 18:38, 24 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

I'll cross-post this query to Wikipedia talk:WikiProject UK Railways, as it's likely to get a better response there. An optimist on the run!   22:23, 24 April 2013 (UTC)[reply]

Requested move 4 March 2017

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The following is a closed discussion of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on the talk page. Editors desiring to contest the closing decision should consider a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.

The result of the move request was: move to Sutton Park line. Primefac (talk) 17:29, 13 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Sutton Park Line → Sutton Park line – Not a proper name; sources (few though they are) generally don't cap line in this one. Dicklyon (talk) 05:19, 4 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]

Evidence from sources
  • The only external link from the article that includes the name is this one, which says "better known as the Sutton Park line".
  • Books and magazines use lowercase line, with only one exception.
  • News items run about 2:1 for lowercase line
Survey
  • Support as nom per the evidence that it's not treated by sources as a proper name. I previously had moved it as uncontroversial, but on request from G-13114, who says it's a proper name, I reverted so we can discuss. Dicklyon (talk) 05:23, 4 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]
  • Oppose: Sorry it took so long to respond, i only just saw this. I've only found three examples of the line being mentioned in local news sources (which isn't surprising as it is freight only) and two of those use the capitalised 'Line', [1] [2]. Secondly I have looked through official documents used by local authorities and the almost all mostly use the capitalised 'Line' [3] [4] [5] [6] (p-15). G-13114 (talk) 21:54, 9 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    Your second news link calls it Sutton Park Passenger Line, Sutton Park Line, and Sutton Park rail line; doesn't really support the idea of it having a proper name. And here are 3 news stories that use lowercased "Sutton Park line" as proposed here: [7], [8], [9]. Of the hits in Google news, the only one with capped Line is in a reader comment. And "official documents" carry little weight compared to secondary sources. Dicklyon (talk) 01:13, 10 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    Yet again, Dicklyon, you are badgering anyone who opposes your one-man crusade, by consistently pulling apart any argument that doesn't suit your purpose. This is the third time I've warned you - please give it a rest. As to this RM: after careful consideration I'm going to oppose it. It's not such a clear case of being a proper name as Cross City Line, Cambrian Coast Line, etc., but my opinion is that it falls more into that category than a descriptive title. Optimist on the run (talk) 06:40, 10 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    Nah, the "crusade" is on the part of railfans who keep engaging in the specialized-style fallacy of "all trainspotter stuff must be capitalised because we are magically different"; see also special pleading. At least two recent RfCs and mass-move RMs have unequivocally concluded to lower-case this stuff when sources are inconsistent, which is what the guidelines say to do in the first place, and we all damned well know that. This is a chicken with its head cut off and still flopping around as if alive.  — SMcCandlish ☺ ☏ ¢ ≽ʌⱷ҅ᴥⱷʌ≼  04:24, 11 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    @Dicklyon You are wrong to say that they aren't third party sources. Those links are from local councils and the local transport planning authority etc, who have no involvement in the running or ownership of the line. Common sense would indicate that if official bodies in official documents regard 'Sutton Park Line' as being the correct title, than their views should have the most weight. G-13114 (talk) 20:08, 11 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]
    Not sure I said that, but let's examine your sources in detail:
    • [10] – Starts off with "services on the Tamworth and Sutton Park rail lines", then uses both Sutton Park Line and Sutton Park line (also Tamworth Line and Tamworth line) in later sentences; also "services on the Tamworth and Sutton Park routes". They sometime omit periods after sentences, like the one that ends with Sutton Park Line. They clearly have not put any care into style or proper name issues.
    • [11] – Calls it both Sutton Park Line and Sutton Park freight line; pretty weak evidence of anything there.
    • [12] – calls it the line through Sutton Park, which is currently freight only. They do also use Sutton Park Line (twice) and Sutton Line (6 times) and Sutton Park (and Birmingham–Tamworth) line (once) in sentences. I don't see this as supporting Sutton Park Line as proper name, but some loose capitalization.
    • [13] (p-15). – a title-case list item The Sutton Park Line. No evidence that they would treat it as a proper name in a sentence, unless you consider this list format to be a sentence and "The" is part of the proper name.
    These docs don't show much evidence of anything approaching professional editing, and no style consistency. So, little or no evidence that reliable secondary sources treat this as a proper name. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Dicklyon (talk • contribs) 20:51, 11 March 2017 (UTC)[reply]
The above discussion is preserved as an archive of a requested move. Please do not modify it. Subsequent comments should be made in a new section on this talk page or in a move review. No further edits should be made to this section.
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