Old Oil Store
The building shown on the plan as Old Oil Store (building 97a) is in Boston Lodge Works next to the former Brass Shop on the North side.
It is the older (rear) part of the building and apart from smaller door and windows is of similar construction to the former Brass Shop to which it is connected corner-to-corner with a slight overlap. Formerly an Oil Store, after the revival it became the S&T Stores. It appears on an insurance plan of 1856[1] but only in outline, which implies it was only a roofless compound at that stage, and is marked 'Coal Depot'. It is not known when it was completed as a building.
It is not known when it went out of use as an Oil Store. There was a later Oil Store attached to the south wall of the Erecting Shop which was demolished around 1964 to make room for track into Road 5 of the then-new Loco Shed. This should not be confused with the present Oil Store attached to the Electrical Workshop.
A small front extension (97) was added in 1970 which occupies the corner between the two buildings but its rendered finish does not match the exposed stone of its neighbours and its low single-pitch roof neither conceals nor matches the gable end of the S&T stores. It housed the Strowger electro-mechanical telephone exchange used from 1960 until 2015 which were installed around the Railway and maintained by a dedicated band of volunteers who salvaged and reconditioned equipment the GPO no longer required. Now the FR has no further use for this equipment.
As part of the Boston Lodge Interpretation and Redevelopment Project it is planned to remove the Telephone Exchange buildinɡ[2] to reveal the frontage of the Old Oil Store, which will be cleared out for repairs and future use[3]. See here[4] for a 1969 picture before the extension was added.
Future plans are to use the old Oil Store/S&T Store as an IT room for the site, following renovation[5].
The old building is described by CADW a 'Former Oil Store' (14418) and listed grade 2.
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S&T Stores 1962, Brass Shop on left.
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Brass Shop with Tel. Exchange in front of S&T Stores. 2013
- ^ Festiniog Railway Heritage Group Journal, Issue 121, page(s): 29
- ^ Boston Lodge Interpretation and Redevelopment Project - Briefing (2020)
- ^ Festiniog Railway Heritage Group Journal, Issue 127, page(s): 19
- ^ Festiniog Railway Heritage Group Journal, Issue 126, page(s): 41
- ^ Ffestiniog Railway Magazine, Issue 246, page(s): 436