The delightful Exeter & Teign Valley Railway ran from Heathfield to Exeter via a number of villages and followed the river Teign. Heathfield, near Bovey Tracey was the site of a junction where the line continued pretty much northwards through Bovey and ended up terminating at Moretonhampstead but also branched off on a rather sharp curve towards Chudleigh, Chudleigh Knighton etc. and on up the Teign Valley. Almost immediately after having left Heathfield on this line one could see the Bovey Lane Crossing. Originally this crossing was built illegally but then an act was passed in 1884 - one of its stipulations was that trains had to pass at 4 MPH. A crossing keepers cottage was built here in 1880 and the Block Indicator and Bell were housed in the living room! After WW2, the crossing keeper was appropriately named Mrs Bovey but she left in 1953. By 1958 the crossing was traincrew operated and then in 1964, the house was demolished. The whole line was sadly officially closed by BR in 1968.
Nowadays, the line is covered by a large works yard nothing to do with railways but you can still see the two lines on the road and also some of the crossing architecture. A local action group has been set up to reinstate the nearby railway line, that runs between Heathfield and Newton Abbot. For more info, go to: http://www.heathraillink.co.uk