Transit in Dubai

Just part of the Emirates Business Lounge at Dubai Airport.

Monday 13th February 2012

Following the late arrival of my aircraft at Birmingham, we were also late leaving. But Emirates have their own lounge in Birmingham now, so I was relaxed about the delay. My earlier post was entered using my Notebook and a good Wi-Fi. It was only after I'd made that post I discovered (tucked in a corner of the lounge) a business centre with seven PCs which I could have used.

Boarding the aircraft (a Boeing 777-300ER) was fast and I had seat 4A in business, next to a charming lady travelling back to Cairns with a brief stop-over in Dubai. The layout in business is 2-3-2 with a state-of-the-art 'lie-flat' seat and on-demand entertainment with hundreds of channels. There was fairly low overcast so, soon after take-off from runway 33, we lost sight of the ground but everywhere seemed white with heavy frost or snow. As we continued over northern Europe, the cloud cleared but the landscape was the same heavy frost or snow we'd seen over England.

They served a very reasonable lunch so I was quite comfortable and I decided to watch the recent cinema release of Le Carre's 'Tinker, Tailor'. I know the earlier BBC television series quite well so it was a bit odd to have different actors in all the roles but it seemed to have the same dystopian feel as the book and the television series so I enjoyed it. I had a brief look at the Speilberg 'Tin Tin' film but I decided I wasn't in the mood for CGI so I flattened the seat and rested. The flight to Dubai takes six to seven hours (depending upon wind). I was starting to get a little restless before we arrived so I watched the new Clooney release 'Ides of March' which I found a bit sub-'West Wing'. Regular readers will have realised that the only time I see new cinema films is during long-distance flights.

Dubai Airport has expanded so much that there are often air traffic delays on landing and we seemed to stooge around before making our final approach, touching down at about 00:45 against a scheduled time of 00:15. The air bridges were promptly connected and I was in the terminal by about 01:00, with plenty of time to kill because my connecting flight EK761 to Johannesburg wasn't scheduled to leave until 04:40.

I walked through the terminal and the experience was rather like visiting the Bull Ring Centre in Birmingham - modern architecture, shops everywhere and lots and lots of people. It amazes me that people are even awake in the middle of the night, let alone grasping these retail opportunities with such relish.

In the past, I've had trouble trying to find a Business Lounge at Dubai but this time I navigated straight to it. I've been to large lounges elswewhere but I think the one I found at Dubai must take the prize (although I suspect there are other candidates I've not yet seen). The lounge seemed to be big enough to qualify as a terminal in its own right and there were many passengers enjoying the various facilities. Having picked up an orange juice, I walked to a business lounge with about 16 PCs. It was quite busy but, fortunately, the users were quiet. So, I was able to give you this update before commencing the second leg of my tour.

To reach Dubai, we've come through a number of time zones and local time has moved forward by (I think) four hours so that locally it's Monday. But Blogger uses its own time and has timestamped the post 'Sunday'. I haven't changed the timestamp.

Into the Dark Continent

The 777-300ER which would take me to Dubai. On the other side of the airfield, just above the nose of the Boeing, you can make out the original terminal building. This reminded me of some of my early flights from Elmdon (as it was then known) some years ago.

Sunday 12th February 2012

Off again! So far I've made it as far as the Emirates Lounge at Birmingham International Airport. The journey to the airport via the M6 was painless and, although the terminal was teeming with passengers, Emirates check-in was prompt. I was told the inbound flight was about 15 minutes late and on my way to the lounge, I spotted the aircraft landing. There's an Express Lane leading to security but, oddly, one member of staff was dividing his time between checking boarding cards on the ordinary lane and the express lane. The Birmingham accent of this gentleman was very apparent as he declaimed in a loud voice "Ooh - Jo'burg. Very nice. And Up the Front all the way!".

Security was the usual unpleasant experience. Shoeless and less hat, scarf and jacket I passed through the arch of a metal detector whilst my possessions were separately X-rayed. A lady then gave me a very thorough 'frisking' before finishing off with a detailed check with a wand-type metal detector.

Once I'd finished getting dressed again, I had to run the gauntlet of duty free but eventually I came to the signs for the Emirates Lounge where I was warmly greeted. Armed with a cup of tea, I fired up the Notebook Computer to send this report.

I'm leaving on flight EK040 to Dubai, due to depart at 13:25 and scheduled into Dubai at a quarter past midnight. Then, I should take the EK761 onto O. R. Tambo Airport, Johannesburg, due in 10:50 on Monday the 13th. I've planned to have a meeting with one of our suppliers in Johannesburg before overnighting at the Protea hotel near the airport. Then, on Tuesday morning, I'm booked to take the BA6291 leaving O. R. Tambo at 11:00 for Livingstone, where I spend a few nights at the Royal Livinstone Hotel. Well, let's hope all these arrangements work out. I'll send an update when I'm able.

There are a few pictures of Birmingham Airport here.

Rail and Canal at Bloomfield

In general, the canals of England came before railways and many proposed railway schemes were opposed by canal owners as threatening their established business.

The construction of canals led to the creation of a mobile, skilled workforce of 'Navigators' ('Navvies') and these skills became vital in the susequent construction of railways. Earlier 'Contour' canals largely followed the existing geography but Telford's 'straight-line' canals were altogether more ambitious, requiring prodigious volumes of spoil to be moved. To produce these more direct canal routes, the surveyor had to determine where cuttings and embankments were required and, wherever possible, use the excavated soil from a cutting to form an embankments. This type of more direct route was exactly what railways were to require. Early steam locomotives had rather limited tractive effort and the inclines had to be kept reasonably gentle by the use of cuttings and embankments.

The success of railways ultimately brough about the demise of most of the canals but there was a period when railways and canals worked as parts of an integrated transport system. In many cases, railways bought up ailing canal companies and there are still remains of various canal/rail interchanges. Even after railways came to dominate the transport industry, the canal interchange traffic struggled on. I believe it survived the second world war but, by the time I was taking a serious interest in the railways of the West Midlands in the 1950s, canal interchange traffic had ceased and the canal basins which served the railways became derelict.

Part of a plan of the Birmingham Canal Navigation dating from around 1920.

When I started visiting Bloomfield Junction signal box on the L&NWR Stour Valley Line from Wolverhampton to Birmingham, I was aware of the abandoned Bloomfield Basins on the Up side and the still-just-active Tipton Five Ways Goods Depot on the Down side but I failed to study the sites in detail. Although I happily walked along main lines to reach signal boxes where I was expected, I was actually quite timid about trespassing. I walked down the sidings from Bloomfield box towards Tipton Five Ways as far as the bridges under the GW but I never actually went into the depot yard, so I only saw it when passing by train on the Stour. I remember walking along the Up sidings to inspect Bloomfield Basin but the site was very overgrown and had become rather hazardous.

Wagon turntables were in use on railways from very early days, initially on narrow-gauge arrangements at coal mines and similar installations.

A cast narrow-gauge wagon turntable at Black Country Living Museum (without the approach tracks).

In the early days of railways, no passenger station would be complete without a battery of turntables to assist in marshalling each train but, eventually, such small turntables became confined to goods yards and canal interchanges. I remember finding a group of wagon turntables at Bloomfield Basins but all the top timbers which should have provided a walking surface had rotted away (or, perhaps, been stolen as fuel). What remained were deep, flooded pits filled with the rusting frameworks and pivots of the wagon turntables which, I'm sorry to admit, discouraged me from further investigation.

I've not been very successful in finding information detailing the area in its heyday. Old maps are not always clear and revision dates can be problematic. So I've prepared a sketch map from various sources which may not be accurate in all details or complete but which, I hope, gives an impression of how matters stood in the early years of the 20th century. The sketch map is below.

A larger version of this sketch can be found here.

The table below explains the numeric references shown on the sketch.

Number	Description
1	Wolverhampton (High Level) - Birmingham (New Street) Stour Valley Line (L&NWR)
2	Wolverhampton (Low Level) - Dudley Line (GWR)
3	Bloomfield Road
4	Bloomfield Terrace (giving access to Bloomfield Basin)
5	Birmingham Canal Navigation
6	Bloomfield Junction Signal Box
7	Tipton Five Ways Signal Box
8	Platelayers' Hut
9	Weighbridge Office
10	Weighbridge Office (probable)
11	Crane
12	Crane
13	Transhipment Shed at Bloomfield Basin
14	Canal access to Bloomfield Basin
15	Canal access to Tipton Five Ways Basin
17	Weighbridge Office (Tipton Five Ways)
18	Bloomfield Basin undeveloped area (later occupied by sidings)

Let's first look at the L.& N. W. R. Bloomfield Basins, at the top of the sketch. There are three separate canal arms and access is not from the 'Main Line' canal but from an older canal. The Stour Valley railway line and Sidings 1, 2, 3 and 4 (siding 1 is nearest the Up Main) are at right angles to most of the quays, although siding 4 (behind the weighbridge office) is adjacent to short quays and two hand-operated cranes. Wagons can be transferred (one at a time) using various wagon turntables from these sidings to sidings running out along the quays. Bloomfield Basin seems to have had 14 wagon turntables in the period being described. As I comment above, at least some of these remained in derelict form into the 1960s.

More to follow ...