174DAB. Off All Saints Street, Hockley Port, Birmingham, West Midlands With thanks to AgentHalogen_87 for informing me of this Survivor. Attached to a building at the end of the small All Saints Industrial Estate (named after a long-demolished church located further up the road) is an abandoned (and heavily vandalised) GEC Z8260 lantern, for two 2 ft (600 mm) 40 Watt T12 linear fluorescent lamps. The Z8260 was a popular lantern for illuminating British Rail property and infrastructure, with station platforms being the most common location that examples would be seen to members of the public. Given that the Industrial Estate was once part of Hockley Goods Yard, the lantern may date back to when the Goods Yard existed, rather than having been installed as part of the modifications that were necessary to convert the site into the Industrial Estate following the redevelopment of the site.

The building to which this lantern is attached is recorded on older maps as being a stable block; presumably, for housing the horses employed to carry goods between the railway and the adjacent canal, as well as for towing the canal boats themselves before the internal combustion engine usurped them.

The lantern is in very poor condition, with only a small portion of the front of the bowl remaining, and the rusted gear tray hanging out. The smashed remains of one of the fluorescent lamps is still attached to its lampholder.

To add to the list of defects, the lantern is also misaligned on its bracket. Notice that the conduit that once housed the electricity cable for this lantern is now severed, with a drainpipe blocking its horizontal route.

A large ballast looks to take up much of the length of the gear tray.

If other Z8260s did exist formerly, all others are long gone now.

One final view of the wrecked lantern, as viewed from directly below.

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