The Signalling Record Society

The Society's Digital Archives

In 2010 the Society received a donation of digital copies of some weekly operating notices and signalling notices. These formed the nucleus of a Digital Archive and the Society has embarked on gradually digitising material held in the paper archive. Priority is being given to Weekly and Periodical Operating Notices as many of these were printed on poor quality paper which is now deteriorating. Other categories of material to receive early attention are Signalling Notices, especially where these are on poor quality paper, and General and Sectional Appendices.

The digital archive is stored on suitable hard drives in the care of the Digital Archivist and backed up locally. An additional back up to cloud storage in real-time provides an 'off-site' copy.

Guide Notes for Scanning Material

Our guide to scanning material and sending it to us can be read on the guide to scanning page.

Collecting Policy

In broad terms the collecting policy matches that of the physical archive at Coventry. However, as it is easier to expand the capacity of the digital archive than the physical one, the collecting policy includes a broader spectrum of operational and related documents.

Wherever possible the digital copy will be the complete document. This is especially important with the Weekly Notices as information about changes of signal frame or locking is often only published in section B. There was no section C announcement because no change was visible to train crews!

Some examples from the Digital Archive are available for download lower down this page, but to access the digital archive itself you need to be a member of the Society. Follow the link at the bottom of the page to join the Society.

The archive files are often large - please bear in mind that they will take some time to download, especially if you are not using broadband. Because of problems with older browsers or out of date plug-ins, it is recommended that files be saved to your own hard drive before opening them to view the contents.

Contributions to the Digital Archive are always welcome. There is a guide to making digital copies here.

Example Documents from the Digital Archive