Woking Electrical Control Room (2016)

If, like me, you were wondering what the room /actually/ looks like: https://www.flickr.com/photos/132123913@N03/albums/721577110...

It's great that so much about those old control rooms is posted here lately!

One thing I notice is how much efforts had been spent to illustrate both the current status of the system, but also it's overall structure and how the two relate - i.e. the actual components of the facility.

Almost all of the dashboards here have some kind of graph, showing the wiring or plumbing between components, or in case of railway control, the railway lines. The graph acts like a map on which status indicators or switches can be placed.

Compare that to modern software "dashboards" which are full of complicated charts showing various metrics, but almost never show the structure of the system.

Misread the title as "Working" control room, and was ready to be amazed that something like that from the first half of the last century was still in use... and not even a PC or screen to be found. But, it was decomissioned in 1997.

Really interesting how depression-era infrastructure like that was still built with so much attention to aesthetic design.

Today it would just be screens on a wall, industrial carpet floor, drop-tile ceiling with LED lights, a few Steelcase cubicles for the operators and little else.

There's something very beautiful about the attention to detail and forethought that has gone into rooms like this.

The wonderful combination of beauty through a clear focus on functionality, supported by just enough of a sense of majesty to lift the whole space beyond pure functionality makes it a little more special.

This is probably a place that was always considered at least somewhat beautiful given its strong design, but more generally speaking I find it really interesting seeing how functional ~1930-1970s era industrial units like this have kinda become fascinating and (in their own way) beautiful places in the eyes of so many (me included).

I often wonder how people in the future will look back at our current humdrum infrastructure and what they might think of it. No doubt there'll be just as much nostalgia and fascination in some quarters, but i have to admit it's a little hard at times for me to see what elements of modern infrastructure will become the focal point of curious minds in, say, the 2050s.

That said, I did visit a museum last year that had some pylon insulators and some other old 1990s electric-grid equipment and I found it kinda interesting and beautiful in its own way so what do I know?!

There is so much cool tech and tech spaces that have been lost in terms of the visual history and story. I wish I could go back in time and capture more of the spaces and artifacts that I was involved in. Perhaps this isn't an issue for anything created in the last 15 years since smartphones have existed.

It could just be that effect where when you see something once (again) you start seeing it everywhere, but I've seen a recent uptick in administration for old control rooms on the internet recently and I appreciate it.

In the age of digital clouds we've lost the tactile experience of managing the infrastructure we rely on to (IMHO) our own detriment.

I would like to imagine that if pushing a change to production meant a development had to walk down a wall of cabinets with blinking lights toggling chunky switches as they went the simple physicality of the act would be enough to make them pause and wonder if everything really was in order.

I was wondering whether it was still in use, and if so for how much longer. Apparently it is no longer operational but, hearteningly, has been historically preserved and is now let out as a period filming location.

https://filming.networkrail.co.uk/filming-locations/woking-e...

This is awesome, seems like a room I would, or should, find in a video game.

It's funny how the appeal/aesthetic to these environments is almost the exact inverse of "liminal spaces".

The font on that website is unreadable, but the photos are OK.