Watch Office and Operations Room at Alconbury Airfield
WATCH OFFICE AND OPERATIONS ROOM AT ALCONBURY AIRFIELD
Listed on the National Heritage List for England. Search over 400,000 listed places
Overview
- Heritage Category:
- Listed Building
- Grade:
- II
- List Entry Number:
- 1067832
- Date first listed:
- 10-Oct-2002
- List Entry Name:
- Watch Office and Operations Room at Alconbury Airfield
- Statutory Address:
- WATCH OFFICE AND OPERATIONS ROOM AT ALCONBURY AIRFIELD
Location
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Discover moreOfficial list entry
- Heritage Category:
- Listed Building
- Grade:
- II
- List Entry Number:
- 1067832
- Date first listed:
- 10-Oct-2002
- List Entry Name:
- Watch Office and Operations Room at Alconbury Airfield
- Statutory Address 1:
- WATCH OFFICE AND OPERATIONS ROOM AT ALCONBURY AIRFIELD
The scope of legal protection for listed buildings
This List entry helps identify the building designated at this address for its special architectural or historic interest.
Unless the List entry states otherwise, it includes both the structure itself and any object or structure fixed to it (whether inside or outside) as well as any object or structure within the curtilage of the building.
For these purposes, to be included within the curtilage of the building, the object or structure must have formed part of the land since before 1st July 1948.
The scope of legal protection for listed buildings
This List entry helps identify the building designated at this address for its special architectural or historic interest.
Unless the List entry states otherwise, it includes both the structure itself and any object or structure fixed to it (whether inside or outside) as well as any object or structure within the curtilage of the building.
For these purposes, to be included within the curtilage of the building, the object or structure must have formed part of the land since before 1st July 1948.
Location
- Statutory Address:
- WATCH OFFICE AND OPERATIONS ROOM AT ALCONBURY AIRFIELD
The building or site itself may lie within the boundary of more than one authority.
- County:
- Cambridgeshire
- District:
- Huntingdonshire (District Authority)
- Parish:
- The Stukeleys
- National Grid Reference:
- TL 19982 76762
Details
ALCONBURY
49/0/10003 Watch Office and Operations Room at 10-OCT-02 Alconbury Airfield
II
Watch office with Operations Room. 1941. Watch office built to Air Ministry Directorate of Works and Buildings drawing no. 7345/41, and extended with operations room to drawing no. 13079/41. Rendered brick with corrugated iron and asbestos roofs. First phase comprised a single-storey watch office to NE, then room for teleprinters etc followed by operations room and kitchen/WC at SW end. The operations room was then extended upwards with the addition of an airfield observation room and extended to the SW with a crew briefing room in the form of a Nissen hut. Steel casement windows. Flight of steel stairs provides access to first-floor door to observation room and to observation area above, surrounded by steel railings.
RAF Alconbury was operational as a satellite bomber station in September 1940. It was handed over to the American Eight Air Force in 1942, who immediately set about extending the runways to facilitate the use of four-engined bombers. Alconbury continued to have an American prescence until 1993, when the base closed. This control tower with attached operations room is the best-preserved example of a standard type built for bomber satellite stations during the Second World War. Control towers comprise the most architecturally distinctive and identifiable examples of the standard building types built on military airfields during the Second World War, 214 being built.
Legacy
The contents of this record have been generated from a legacy data system.
- Legacy System number:
- 489817
- Legacy System:
- LBS
Legal
This building is listed under the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990 as amended for its special architectural or historic interest.
Map
This map is for quick reference purposes only and may not be to scale. This copy shows the entry on 04-Jun-2026 at 14:08:06.
Download a full scale map (PDF)End of official list entry
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