Leek Brook junction signal box on the Churnet Valley Railway

Signal box on the Churnet Valley Railway, dating from the late 1860s. Built by McKenzie and Holland for the North Staffordshire Railway, the building is constructed of Staffordshire blue brick with wooden weatherboarding and a hipped Welsh slate roof.

The building rises three storeys. The lower two storeys are laid in English Garden Wall bond. The east elevation, facing the Churnet Valley line, features two round-arched windows to the ground floor, now bricked in. A large brick buttress stands on the south elevation, and a bricked-in doorway on the north side provided access to the locking room. The uppermost storey has continuous fenestration beneath the weatherboarding on all elevations. Most windows have been boarded over; surviving examples retain their 2/2 sliding casements. A wooden stair originally accessed the operating floor from the north but has since been removed. The cast iron bracketed balcony and entrance porch survive. The west elevation mirrors the east, with a central louvred section marking the position of the stove.

Internally, the cabin retains its 40 lever McKenzie and Holland No. 6 pattern frame, though some levers have been removed. The frame faces east across the Churnet Valley line. The middle floor provides access to the rodding system via a hatch in the locking room ceiling. The ground floor locking room preserves the pulley wheels and vertical signal lever rods, though horizontal rods have been removed.

The North Staffordshire Railway opened in 1849 with a line from North Rode near Macclesfield to Uttoxeter. A branch line was added in 1867, departing the mainline south of Stoke. McKenzie and Holland, among the earliest signalling contractors, designed signal boxes for the railway until 1875, when they adopted NSR specifications featuring gable ends and decorative bargeboards. The 40 lever frame was installed in 1903 when the line to Waterhouses and Caldon opened to the east.