Snow Hill was once the main station of the Great Western Railway in Birmingham and, at its height, it rivalled New Street station with competitive services to destinations including London Paddington, Wolverhampton Low Level, Birkenhead Woodside, Wales and South West England.

After fifteen years of closure, a new Snow Hill station, the present incarnation, was built; it reopened in 1987.

When it was originally reopened in 1987, it had four, but one was later converted in 1999 for use as a terminus for West Midlands Metro trams on the line from Wolverhampton.

The station was opened in 1852 on the Great Western Railway (GWR) main line from London Paddington to Wolverhampton Low Level and Birkenhead Woodside.

[2] It was never intended to be the main station, but the railway was prevented from reaching its original intended terminus at Curzon Street; London and North Western Railway's engineer Robert Stephenson and solicitor Samuel Carter argued in Parliament that there would be safety risks in rival companies sharing the congested connection into their station.

[9] However the electrification of the rival West Coast Main Line into New Street, meant that British Railways decided to concentrate all services into Birmingham into one station, and Snow Hill was seen as being an unnecessary duplication.

[2] Services to London, the West Country, Stourbridge and Shrewsbury were diverted to New Street, and the branch to Dudley was closed.

With this, as most passenger facilities in the station were withdrawn and virtually the entire site became disused save for one bay platform, Snow Hill then acquired the unfortunate title of "the largest unstaffed railway halt in the country".

[citation needed] A few items, including the original gates and booking hall sign, were saved and later used in the Moor Street restoration.

The decision was actually against the recommendation of the Beeching report, which highlighted the route through Snow Hill and Wolverhampton Low Level as an important one to stay open, however the London Midland region didn't want to have a line duplicate to their own from New Street to Wolverhampton High Level.

The West Midlands Passenger Transport Authority had adopted a policy to restore cross-city rail services through Snow Hill since the 1970s, a project which was completed in two phases.

Some parts of the original station are still visible (notably the now-sealed entrance, with GWR crest, in Livery Street).

Services at Moor Street, where these services had previously terminated, were switched from the former terminal platforms, which then closed, on to two newly built through platforms, at the southern end of Snow Hill tunnel, making a through station adjacent to the tunnel mouth.

[20] In May 1993 Network SouthEast reintroduced limited-stop services to London, initially on a two-hourly frequency, routed to Marylebone instead of the pre-closure destination of Paddington.

Work began on a new entrance on Livery Street to give commuters access to the lower Snow Hill and Jewellery Quarter part of the city centre in 2005, but it did not open for business until March 2011.

[25] Although construction and interior finishes' works were largely complete by December 2010, legal disputes between London Midland, Network Rail and Centro caused delay to the opening of the entrance by over a year.

Trams terminated at St Paul's[35] until the first part of the extension was brought into service as far as Bull Street on 6 December 2015.

[36] As part of the extension, a new through Snow Hill stop at a different location opened outside the station and further west, on the existing viaduct near the Livery Street entrance.

[38][39] A new viaduct was built alongside the station as part of the Snowhill development to carry the tram lines into the city centre.

[43][44][45] In December 2018 it was announced that a new entrance would be constructed at Snow Hill station, by opening up an arch in the railway viaduct.

[needs update][46] In October 1854, a derailed engine fell into Great Charles Street, below the station.