Back to Peak Forest

Little more than two months after my last visit (27 August 2024) I am tempted to pay a return to marvellously photogenic Peak Forest South after being contacted by the signaller who had been on duty that day, who kindly invites me to return and pay a visit to the signal box itself.

Peak Forest South Signal Box is a delightfully preserved and recently overhauled box that will be celebrating its centenary in 2025. It is one of only two mechanical signal boxes I can name in this country, Crag Hall on Teesside being the other, which control nothing but freight traffic.

This is a very busy location, with up to 70 loco movements each day that comprise stone traffic to and from the four nearby quarries, the closest two being Peak Forest Cemex north of the nearby road bridge, and Tunstead Quarry and Sidings about a mile to the south. The other two are Hindlow and Dowlow, south-east of Buxton.

Trains from these latter two will work to Buxton, before reversing and looping round to join the route via Peak Forest to Chinley, a surviving stub of the former Midland Railway main line from Manchester to Matlock and St. Pancras. At Chinley there is a triangular junction with the Hope Valley Line from Manchester to Sheffield.

There are a total of six semaphores and numerous shunting discs controlled from its 50-lever frame. Semaphores visible from the box comprise up starter PF19 just south of the road bridge, down home PF22 (with fixed distant beneath) a bracket housing up home PF17 and a subsidiary signal PF13 for exit from the up loop, and down section signal PF21, also with a fixed distant beneath.

To see the elusive sixth semaphore requires a walk along a path that climbs above the railway and signal box, south of the former Peak Forest station, and offers a panoramic view of the loco stabling sidings and the route on towards Tunstead Quarry. From here you can see the motor-worked up distant signal (PF16), which is mounted below the Great Rocks section signal.

Picking a Friday (1 November 2024) for my visit to the charming signal box meant that there was rather less freight action than there had been during my summer trip, with just two arrivals, along with the Railhead Treatment Train (RHTT), during the two hours I was in the box and a light engine movement by 66094 when it returned from nearby Tunstead Sidings to join a couple of classmates on the depot.

Travelling to and from Park Forest I was able to avoid the hazardous 30-minute walk from Dove Holes station after discovering I could take Skyline bus 199 all the way from the smart new Stockport Interchange (five minutes from the rail station). This Manchester Airport-Buxton service runs hourly via Peak Dale and drops you right outside the old station yard, taking just over an hour to get there from Stockport.

I am hugely grateful to resident signaller Joshua Pope-Lewis for his kind invitation to the signal box and for his hospitality and wisdom during my visit.