LNER Route: Leicester to Marylebone

Braunston & Willoughby: gcrbw60

View of Braunston & Willoughby station's signal cabin with staff posing for the camera circa 1910. The GCR used the term cabin rather than box when describing their signal, a practice also adopted by the LNWR. The box is an example of a type introduced by the MS&L in 1894, but was built after the company renamed itself the Great Central to emphasise its newly created London route. Whilst the majority of these boxes were built with brick bases some, as seen above were an all-wood examples, and features included a shallower roof pitch and a lean-to porch. Only the corner window sections of the glazed windows slide open. This was to provide access to the footwalk so that the signalman could clean the windows. Steve Banks writes. 'The signal boxes were built with brick bases on level ground. Where it was elevated, on an embankment, for example, they were lighter, all-wood.'

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