Modelling the CN Telegraph Repeater Station

The CN telegraph repeater station was co-located at the Outer Station site on Montreal Street. According to Smithson (see below) the repeater station was built by CN in 1928, at a pre-Depression cost of $60,000. Located amid CN's pole line, poles were spaced 48 to the mile, with a double-pole H structure every quarter-mile. Once fibre-optics were installed along CN's Kingston Subdivision, the pole line was transferred to the CN Signal Department.

Telegrams (below), Telex and Teletype were still important means of doing business in Canada when this booklet was printed (below). Becoming part of CNCP Telecommunications, subsequent owners were Unitel and AT&T Canada.

The current state of the repeater station is rough. This September, 2019 view shows the structure is still in place, though boarded-up.

Gordon Smithson, author of the seminal volume At the Bend in the Road - Kingston worked at the station, and included a photo in his book, as well as several interior views. For this build, I used the ubiquitous Pola/Tyco factory building - one I'd picked up at a train show - that had been equipped with a neat curved, green balsa wood roof and interior:

Neat roof and details! This structure matched the limited footprint I had available for the completed model. I would maintain the irregular window heights and wall pilasters. I must say I'm not completely happy with the finished product's fidelity to the original. It's a marshmallow structure - I had to squeeze it quite a bit in its dimensions! The prototype is 70 feet in length and 30 feet in width, roughly twice as big as mine.

The Dremel tool took off the false front ends, and I used scrap styrene to form the new roof:

But it's a four-sided roof and tricky to get the right look. So I used paper templates to get the ends cut:

That went well, though the roof sits up a bit high on my marshmallow! Like a top hat! I trusted that the roofline and the dormer-type rooftop windows would carry the day and make it believable.

I decided I'd use cardstock to produce a shingle roof. Final view before roofing began:

I used the same technique as the Woolen Mill - sacrifice the natural brick colour to get mortar. Paint the whole structure a light colour! Then, dry-brush the brick colour on:

Strips of 'shingles' applied up from the eaves. I shingled the dormers separately, then cut the strips around the dormer, reuniting them with a contiguous strip at the roof peak:

Final painting included the sides of the dormers, white eaves, windows light grey, completed interior window glazing, steps, added cardstock lintels above the windows. The finished structure is shoehorned between the Kingston Subdivision mainline and the Hanley Spur continuous-run trackage:

But I thought it was important to have it near the station, as was the prototype! More details, scenicking and signage were to follow. I photographed, copied and printed some CNCP Telecommunications and Telex 'signs', adding lettering for a bilingual CN Telecommunications Repeater Station sign:

 Then I cut out and added the signs and some other small details to the scrapbox to the structure:

The previous owner added the fan an open doors to the structure, having removed two windows and bricked one in:

As mentioned previously, the builing has only a small footprint. The eaves must be positioned clear of tracks at both corners! I'd like to add more H-poles and even small microwave dishes, as long as I don't hit them with my arm when operating - a current hazard to other buildings along Montreal Street at layout edge!

 Link to photos of the Kingston repeater station here.