Query on birmingham new street?

If it had headed out in the same direction you would have ended up travelling either towards Bristol, or to the north-west. Birmingham New Street is a hub and lines of many of the old, pre nationalisation companies, lines meet there. From Reading you followed the line of the old Great Western Railway via Oxford and Banbury taking Bordesley Junction in Birmingham to gain the Midland Railway tracks and then via St. Andrews Junction and Gloucester Junction, to gain Birmingham New Street. To travel to Newcastle, the train travelled back the way you had come, again via Gloucester Junction and then Aston Junction to gain the old Midland Railway tracks to Burton, Derby and Sheffield.