Metro-Cammell


Metro-Cammell, fully the Metropolitan Cammell Carriage and Wagon Company was an English manufacturer of railway carriages, locomotives and railway wagons, based in Saltley and subsequently Washwood Heath in Birmingham. Purchased by GEC Alstom in May 1989, the factory was closed by its eventual owner Alstom in 2005.
The company has designed and built trains for the railways in the United Kingdom and overseas, including the Mass Transit Railway of Hong Kong, Kowloon-Canton Railway, the Channel Tunnel, the Tyne and Wear Metro and locomotives for Malaysia's Keretapi Tanah Melayu. Diesel and electric locomotives were manufactured for South African Railways, Nyasaland Railways, Malawi, Nigeria, Trans-Zambezi Railway and Pakistan; DMUs for Jamaica Railway Corporation; and DMUs for National Railways of Mexico. The vast majority of London Underground rolling stock manufactured in mid 20th century was produced by the company. It also designed and built the Blue Pullman for British Railways.

History

Metropolitan Railway Carriage and Wagon Company Ltd

The company was formed in 1863 as the Metropolitan Railway Carriage and Wagon Company Ltd of London. Joseph Wright built coaches for the London and Southampton Railway in 1837 and the London and Birmingham Railway in 1838. In 1845 he moved the carriage works from London to Birmingham, where he purchased of meadowland in Saltley, adjacent to the Birmingham and Derby Junction Railway line. In 1854, the company built the first 12 carriages for the Sydney to Parramatta line, New South Wales, the first public railway in Australia, which opened in 1855. Several of these are now in the Powerhouse Museum in Sydney.

Metropolitan Amalgamated Railway Carriage and Wagon Company Ltd

In 1902, it merged with four other carriage and wagon builders i.e. Ashbury Railway Carriage and Iron Co Ltd v Riche, Brown, Marshalls and Co. Ltd., Lancaster Railway Carriage and Wagon Co Ltd and Oldbury Railway Carriage and Wagon Co Ltd become Metropolitan Amalgamated Railway Carriage and Wagon Company Ltd.
Metropolitan were contracted as a builder of the new tanks for the British Army during the First World War. They built all 400 of the Mark V tank and 700 improved Mark V* tanks. These were the most developed heavy tank designs to see service in the war.
In 1917, Metropolitan Railway Carriage and Wagon Company and Vickers Limited took joint control of British Westinghouse. In 1919 Vickers bought out the Metropolitan shares and renamed the company Metropolitan-Vickers.
By 1926, they had changed their name again to Metropolitan Carriage, Wagon and Finance Company Ltd.
In 1929, the railway rolling stock business of Cammell Laird and Company was merged as Metropolitan-Cammell Carriage and Wagon Company Ltd, the resulting company being part owned by Vickers and the Cammell Laird group.
MCCW also built bus bodies. In 1932, Metro Cammell Weymann was formed by the MCCW's bus bodybuilding business and Weymann Motor Bodies.
In the Second World War, Metro built tanks again, including the Valentine tank and Light Tank Mk VIII.
Saltley works was closed in 1962 and group administration concentrated at Washwood Heath in 1967.

Closure by Alstom

In May 1989 the railway business was sold to GEC Alsthom Group. The last trains to be built at the Washwood Heath plant before its closure in 2005 were the Class 390 "Pendolino" tilting trains for the West Coast Main Line modernisation.

Products

Heavy rail

London Underground