Exminster, Devon

The station building survives here but the platforms have gone. Opened in 1852 by the South Devon Railway it closed 112 years later in 1964. Until the MAS scheme for the main line was switched on the large signal box located here controlled all movements. But even after it closed in 1986 its life was not over, or so it seemed at the time. My understanding is that it was adopted by the RSPB with the intention of using it as a hide for observing waterfowl on the Exe Estuary, but in the end this did not materialise. Too noisy, apparently. However, the box was acquired by the Gloucestershire Warwickshire Railway and moved for reuse at Broadway on their preserved line. But it never was. A new brick signal box was built for that station instead and the fate of Exminster signal box is not clear. Is it laying abandoned in the long grass in Warwickshire, of has it long gone?