The Brummie railwaymen of Transylvania
‘Rolling hills, peeing down with rain, I feel like it's nearly back at home’
Dear Patchers — Welcome to your Wednesday briefing.
What’s your idea of a perfect holiday? Whatever it is, I’m going to hedge my bets and suggest few of you would say rebuilding railway tracks in the valley of a Transylvanian mountain range. And yet, I know a few Patchers will say that because that’s exactly what you were doing when Joshi Herrmann happened to be there on a recent trip and bumped into you in the pub. That’s the subject of today’s big story — the Brummies who know anything and everything about railway infrastructure and are putting it to good use in the Hârtibaciu Valley.
Elsewhere, with the mayoral race heating up, many are asking if Andy Street can buck national trends and beat Labour. Analysis in CITYAM suggests he can, while leading politics professor Rob Ford is simply astonished there is no polling data for what will be “the biggest contest” in next month’s local elections.
In other news, Hollywood stars are throwing themselves behind the campaign to save Station Street and plans for Birmingham City’s stadium have finally been confirmed.
Finally, Eid Mubarak to all who are celebrating today! We wish you a joyous Eid Al Fitr.
Brum in Brief
🧑💼Brand Andy: The upcoming West Midlands mayoral election will see Conservative incumbent Andy Street vie to keep his job for a third term. The backdrop? Support for his party has dropped to its lowest level since the days of Liz Truss’ premiership. Yet analysis in business paper CITYAM suggests that our local battle might be fought on personal brand rather than voter’s views on party politics. Politics professor Rob Ford has taken a close look at what both Labour and Conservative candidates have going for and against them, concluding it is a very close race. But, he says, “we have nothing to go on” because no one is polling the West Midlands electorate.
🎥Succession X Station Street: Braveheart actor Brian Cox CBE has thrown his support behind the campaign to have Station Street, home to both The Electric Cinema and The Crown, designated an historic, cultural and civic asset. The Scottish actor, who is well known for his portrayal of media mogul Logan Roy in HBO’s Succession, is already a patron of The Old Rep Theatre and says that Station Street’s planned re-development — which The Dispatch covered here — threatens more than the street itself. More here.
🏟️Hot wheels: The capital investors who own Birmingham City Football Club have confirmed their purchase of the former Wheels site in Bordesley. Plans for the site are expected to include a new sports stadium and a “sports quarter” which will include training grounds as well as retail and community facilities. Tom Wagner, founder of Knighthead, who own Blues through a subsidiary firm, added: “The plans for the Sports Quarter will bring global interest to our Club and to Birmingham as a whole.”
🏗️Planning palaver: Plans for a new food and entertainment venue in Wolverhampton have been thrown into disarray with new sites for the £6m venue now being considered. Originally the venue, provisionally named Bell Works, was meant to be developed between Cleveland St and Bell St — indeed, derelict shops were demolished for the project last year — but now the council is considering new locations with the timeline of the project set to be affected. All the details.
🎤UB40 2.0: A bitter feud led to UB40 splitting into two competing bands 15 years ago — if you’re a big fan of the Ali Campbell faction, you’re in luck. They’ll be playing at the Utilita Arena on Saturday with support from Bitty Mclean. Tickets here.
🎭Promises, promises: From today, and for the rest of the week, theatre-goers can catch a first-ever showing of The Promise at The Rep, a play about the experience of deaf people with dementia. I caught a previous show, 4.48 Psychosis, from this company years ago and will vouch for their delicate and imaginative portrayals of mental wellbeing. Tickets here.
The Brummie railwaymen of Transylvania
By Joshi Herrmann
I’m in the peaceful Hârtibaciu Valley in the foothills of Transylvania’s stunning Făgăraș Mountains when a middle-aged man in a high-viz jacket approaches me.
“You know the HS2 Bridge at Washwood Heath?” he asks expectantly (the name vaguely rings a bell — a high speed rail depot somewhere in Hodge Hill? This man clearly assumes a high level of infrastructure knowledge on behalf of his interlocutors). “I engineered that.”
Within minutes, we’re talking about the tram extension to Dudley. “You look at the transport policies in Birmingham, they are all about improving mobility, particularly to areas of deprivation,” another man, called Keith, tells me. Keith works at the London Transport Museum and his interest in railways is slightly more political. Philosophical even.
“That's the whole point of railways, they are a social benefit,” he tells me, as chickens cluck from a farmer’s smallholding behind us. “Railways are at the core of how a society should function”.
I knew to expect this kind of conversation at the trackside in Hosman, an idyllic village with a fortified church around 30 minutes’ drive from the mediaeval Romanian city of Sibiu. I’m supposed to be enjoying a break from journalism in my girlfriend’s beautiful hometown. But anywhere you go in the world, even in remote Transylvania, you cannot escape Brummies doing strange and wonderful things.
Late last night I was sitting in a Scottish-themed pub on the edge of Sibiu’s main square when I met a group of men drinking at the next table. When they said that most of them were West Midlanders, I started telling them about The Dispatch, a new publication I had helped to start a few months ago.
They cut me off: they’re already Patchers, and they love it. Suddenly we’re best friends and I’ve committed to ripping up my holiday plans and coming to visit the Mocănița, the narrow-gauge mountain railway they are helping to rebuild in the nearby countryside. And writing about it.
This part of Transylvania is known for rolling hills and pretty Kirchenburgen, fortified churches built by the so-called Saxons, the Germanic people who settled these lands hundreds of years ago. It’s not far from the villages where King Charles owns various houses and farms. In fact, when he was still a prince, Charles promised to visit this very railway, which used to lead from Sibiu to Sighișoara, a picturesque town once inhabited by Vlad Dracul, the father of the real Dracula, Vlad the Impaler.
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