Month: September 2021

After an enjoyable visit last month (2 August 2021) to Par and St. Blazey, it is time to pay a return visit to another of the doomed trio of Cornish signal boxes and spend a few hours photographing trains and semaphores at Lostwithiel.

Like the box at nearby Par, Lostwithiel Crossing Signal Box enjoys a Grade II Listing and, until its planned closure in autumn 2023, controls more semaphore signals (14) than any of the other mechanical signalling outposts in the Royal Duchy.

Taking another rail excursion from the Scottish capital following an enjoyable day at Stonehaven, my destination this time (3 September 2021) is the first, rather than the last, of the ten remaining outposts of mechanical signalling between Edinburgh and Aberdeen.

Cupar is a pleasant place to visit, even on a gloomy day, being just one hour by train from Edinburgh, with an attractive and historic station building and a 1910-vintage North British Type 7 signal box that stands north of the down platform and controls three semaphores from its 32-lever frame.

After my early summer trip to Arbroath and Inverkeilor (blog post: 10 June 2021), it’s time to take another train trip from Edinburgh to North-East Scotland, to see and photograph trains and signals at the final outpost of mechanical signalling on the East Coast Main Line to Aberdeen.

Stonehaven, 16¼ miles south of the Granite City, is home to an attractive and listed Caledonian Railway Type 2 box dating in its present form from 1901, but the extension of a much earlier Caledonian Railway box dating from the opening of the station in 1849, and now controls a total of six semaphores.