North Signal Box of Kaohsiung Port Station 🇹🇼 (2023-04)

North Signal Box (notes from the official leaflet)
高雄港車站 北號誌樓

The Core Value of North Signal Box (NSB)
The most essential and complicated function of NSB is to achieve the "signal-signal", "signal-turnout", "turnout-turnout" interlocking. Wit the interlocking bed ensuring the coordination between levers, levers can in turn "remote control" the turnouts and signals in electrical and mechanical ways so as to coordinate operations of these devices. Before radio was available, the employees could also control and monitor the train dispatching by using the yard inter-phone.

NSB
The air traffic control tower directs takeoff and landing of aircraft, and the lighthouse guides ships to safety, while the signal box is the hub of train dispatching. Through sophisticated mechanical interlocking, the signal box controls the switches on the distant ground to ensure the efficient and safe operation of train arrivals and departures at the station.
During Japanese Colonial Era, signal boxes could be found at various larger train stations with complicated tracks layout, but as of today, only four of them are preserved. Among them, NSB of Kaohsiung Port Station, a two-story modest structure, has been left intact by chance, as passenger trains do not go through this station and, therefore, modernization has not been necessary. Now it is the only signal box in Taiwan with a complete interlocking system and operational capability.
The NSB was decommissioned in November 2008. Not only was the structure preserved at the original spot, but the equipment was also largely preserved, including the mechanical lever, the electric lever, interlocking bed, the electric locked box, display board, the electric tablet block instrument, the yard inter-phone, and the mechanical interlocking system connected to the signal box, iron bars connected to the switches, and other related mechanical instruments. For this preservation project, Kaohsiung Light Rail line near the site was also redesigned. NSB is a beautiful demonstration of the cutting edge of mechanical technology in the late 19th century and the early 20th century.
NSB, along with the old train station house, was listed as a Kaohsiung historic site named Takao Railway Station in July 2010, and was further incorporated into the cultural landscape "Kaohsiung Port Station and Old Harbor Area - Railway Tracks and Architecture Group" in 2018.

1st Floor Employee Break Room
To the south of the machine room was an employee break room, which was a later addition to the building out of the necessity of a space for the on-duty staff to take a break and get ready for next shift.

1st Floor Machine Room
The iron bars connected to the levers travel downward through the floor to this machine room, turn horizontal, closely parallel to the ground floor, then pass through the front wall bottom to outside the house, and eventually connect to various switches to control the turnouts around the station.

2nd Floor Balcony
All four walls of the 2nd floor are installed with continuous large sliding windows with the glass windowpanes offering greater penetration of natural light. There are doors open to the east and the south, so that the employees could step outside onto the balcony to observe the operations at the station, and to use flag signals to direct train dispatching.

2nd Floor Operations Control Room
The second floor, whose floor, walls and roof are made of wood, is an open space office without any partition walls. In the north part of the room are the switch levers, signal levers, and the interlocking bed which coordinates all the levers. All these are linked to the machine room down below. Above the levers is the display board, which shows the service status of each switch. The south part used to be the working space, equipped with things such as the electric tablet block instrument linked to Qianzhen Depot, train approaching warning system, and the switchboard of yard inter-phones.

Exhibition Area
1. Daily Duties of Signal Box Staff
Employee break room, located on the first floor of NSB, was where the staff took a break. The interview video clips broadcast here focus on the daily routines of the staff, and the instruments they used plus their mechanism.
2. Past Glories of NSB
The second floor of NSB has been restored to the former state and now houses precious artifacts that show its cultural heritage value. This area exhibits the preserved artifacts, supplemented with a building model, and AR technology, giving the visitors a glimpse into the past glories of trains arriving at and departing from Kaohsiung Port Station.
3. NSB - Workmanship of the Times
The mechanism of railways and the signal box is further illustrated through images, graphics, texts, as well as animations.

Historic train footage courtesy of
cswmmoft: https://youtu.be/HrMHVm2nwWc
pimicat: https://youtu.be/hjphiIz_qaE

Music:
heartbeatmusical3051: Best of slow Blues 2021
https://youtu.be/5cKtJJfBGBg