Birmingham New Street Power Signal Box 3D Scan (August 2023)

A video of the 3D (Matterport) scanning exercise of the iconic Power Signal Box (PSB) at Birmingham’s New Street Station, undertaken in August of 2023 with the permission of Network Rail (Virtual reality keeps Birmingham’s iconic power signal box alive (networkrailmediacentre.co.uk). The PSB’s operational service came to an end on Christmas Eve, 2022 when the final train under its control was moved, some 56 years after it came online. Originally built as part of the modernisation of the West Coast main line, the Birmingham Box was one of only four PSBs in the West Midlands, replacing 64 manually operated signal boxes back in the 1960s. The PSB is now being converted into a training academy for the railway signallers of the future, although the Box’s exterior - a surviving example of Birmingham’s re-cast concrete “Brutalist Architecture” - will remain the same, thanks to its Grade II listing. This 3D scan and “Virtual Tour” was launched online by Network Rail nearly one year after the PSB ceased operation. For one day only (in March 2023), members of the public who were lucky enough to win one of 60 tickets in a 2-week ballot were given a final 45-minute tour to wonder at the incredible contents of the Box, including the unique Westpac Mk 1 signalling system, which, amazingly, had remained in place until the Box’s closure. Now the PSB has been preserved digitally, so that the railway engineering heritage can be experienced by all.