Visit to Nuneaton PSB

Last Thursday I went on a visit with other members from the local Railway Correspondence & Travel Society (RCTS) branch to Nuneaton Power Signal Box (PSB). The photo above is a close-up of the station area on the Panel. This is an Entry Exit Panel with the signaller setting the route by pressing or pulling the buttons (I can't remember which!) shown. Once the route is set the track circuits light up in green. When occupied by a train, they turn red and the small rectangular boxes that appear blank in this view will be populated with the 4 character alpha-numeric description of that train.


Nuneaton Box was opened in 1963 and will be abolished at the end of August 2008 as part of the West Coast modernisation programme with control moving to Rugby Signalling Control Centre (SCC). Other boxes to be abolished include Coventry, Rugby PSB, Bletchley and Watford - all of these with the exception of Coventry which has already closed, will be abolished in the next 4 years. Already the two lines nearest Nuneaton PSB are controlled from Rugby SCC and these serve the cross country route from Leicester to Birmingham New Street.


The view above shows the full extent of Nuneaton Panel. The station area is to the left of the Panel, with the West Coast mainline across the top of the Panel and a continuation of the four main running lines shown at the bottom. The area of control fringes with Rugby to the south (around Brinklow) and north to Tamworth. The Panel also controls the branch to Coventry (roughly centre in this picture - the two lines diverging from the WCML). The original box ended approximately where the clock is in this view, with an extension added later. The Panel itself also includes an extension, for control as far Colwich but ultimately this was never realised.


Seen on the evening were the usual diet of Virgin Pendolino's and London Midland Desiro's as well as Cross Country 170s on the Birmingham-Leicester axis. Freight wise it was more interesting with Scotrail 90024 piloting EWS 92004 and almost unique 60007 in the defunct Loadhaul livery. There was some drama a little later with a report that train 1V71, a Cross Country Voyager was on fire at Birmingham New Street. Needless to say New Street was evacuated and Virgin Pendo's made additional stops at Nuneaton as a result. The incident couldn't have been serious as 1V71 was on the move a short while later heading ECS back to Central Rivers.


It was a thoroughly interesting evening and fascinating watching trains on the move both on the Panel and from an excellent vantage point in the PSB.