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Summary

Description

Circa 1917, North British Railway Company, Type 7 signal box. 2-storey rectangular plan, timber weather-boarded signal serving private line at Rosyth Dockyard (see Notes). Multi-pane glazing to first floor signal cabin reached by timber forestair with projecting entrance porch to W. Piended grey slate roof with projecting eaves. Wide projecting red brick chimneystack rises from ground and breaks eaves to N.

INTERIOR: signalling apparatus survives inside with Stevens and Sons patent frame.

Statement of Special Interest

Signal boxes are a distinctive and now rare building type that make a significant contribution to Scotland's diverse industrial heritage. Of more than 2000 signal boxes built across Scotland by 1948, around 150 currently survive (2013) with all pre-1948 mechanical boxes still in operation on the public network due to become obsolete by 2021.

Rosyth Signal Box is an excellent North British Railway Company 'Type 7' signal box, constructed between the wars to serve the hugely important naval base and dockyard at Rosyth. Type 7 boxes were the standard design by NBR between the years of 1908 and 1918. Few had timber bases, with most being of brick, and the Roysth example is a particularly unusual survival. The timber weather-boarded signal box retains its signalling lever frame and other apparatus. A different Type 7 box is at Arbroath (see separate listing). Of around 700 boxes built by this company, less than 30 are known to remain extant on the railway network (as of 2013).

Rosyth dockyard is the only new naval dockyard in the UK since the Napoleonic era. Work to create a naval base at Rosyth was begun in 1909 and officially opened by George V in 1915. The dockyard was run down after the Armistice but came back into full operation during the Second World War. It continues in use as a working dockyard on both naval and commercial contracts (2012).

It has not currently been established when the platform halt to service the dockyard was constructed but it is likely that it was sometime between the World Wars. The station itself no longer survives.

Change of category from C to B and list description and statutory address revised as part of Scottish Signal Box Review (2012-13). Previously listed as "Rosyth Dockyard, Barham Road, Signal Box at NT 10953 82170".

References

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