Fellow Modelers,
The MRMag. Information Station on Trackside Details provides diagrams and useful tips on modelling line details such as instrument cabinets, switch heaters, telephone booths etc… One opportunity for a line detail that I am planning are telephone booths which, presumably, were used before radio or maybe in remote mountainous areas where there is no communications coverage.
It seems pretty obvious that instrument cabinets, switch heaters, burners and the like should be placed at every signal or turnout respectively. But how often does one place a telephone booth? Should they be place on either turnout of a siding? At every turnout that is somewhat remote, and not in a yard? Periodically along the mainline? Before tunnel entrances?
Your sage advice would be helpful.
Cheers,
FJK
In the places I’ve been a “telephone booth” was just a box on the pole line (about 6-8" deep, a foot wide and about 1.5 to 2 ft tall). It had a phone that was connected to the dispatcher’s phone line (you couldn’t 'dial" anything). They would be located at absolute signals (ends of sidings, remotely operated interlockings).
The phone boxes I remember were in every small town that was along the line. These were along the old Erie/Erie Lackawanna. I grew up in a small village along the line where there was a small depot. There was a feed mill adjacent to that depot that was served by rail. There was also a crossover on the double-track main. right by the turnout for the mill switch (stub end) there was a phone box. The dimensions that dehuseman gave are a bit smaller than the ones I remember. the pole-mounted affair looked to be a bird house on steroids. It was not a shelter, but the roof was hung out over the double-door opening far enough so that the conductor/trainman could keep the elements off whatever he had to write on. It was constructed of wood. I can’t remember what the roofing material was made of. The rail line was protected by a centralized train control (CTC) block system using three position semiphore signals.