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Post by chrish on Jun 13, 2009 23:31:24 GMT
I think DaveR made a request a few months ago for a few pictures of London to be posted on here, especially parts of London which are a little off the main tourist trail. I wince everytime I see coachloads of poor foreign tourists being dropped off at Madame Tussord's to queue for hours to get in and see a wax version of Simon Cowell in a compromising position with Susan Boyle. I'll start with some of Canary Wharf. These are taken from the other side of the river from Canary Wharf in the area of Rotherhithe which also puts it name to a nearby road tunnel.      Now we have the famous Battersea Power Station. It ceased producing electricity in 1983 and it's still the largest Brick building in Europe. It was designed by Sir Giles Gilbert Scott who also designed the Bankside Power Station (which is now the Tate Modern), Liverpool Cathedral and the Red Telephone Box! I first became aware of the building from the inlay card of Morrissey's Bona Drag album! "All over Battersea, some hope and some despair" from a song from a later album! You can also see the disused cranes that unloaded the coal from barges brought up the Thames.  and from the other side.  This a view from the Cranes back down towards Vauxhall. On the left above the trees is the M15 building, in the middle you have the huge St George Wharf and then just to the right of them is the gasworks near to the Oval Cricket Ground.  The same shot a little later at night!  Next we have Grosvenor Rail Bridge which links London Victoria with the line down to Clapham junction and to the South Coast.   Just to the left we have Chelsea Bridge. Britains first self anchored Suspension bridges with all the materials from the British Empire. Granite from Aberdeen and Cornwall, Timber from British Columbia, steel from Scotland and Yorkshore and the asphalt comes from Trinidad.  Next up we have some black and white shots I took whilst on my way into work last week during the London Underground strike. I can assure you that although I took these in my car I was perfectly stationary for at least a minute before and after taking each picture. It took me 2 hours 21 minutes to drive the 8 miles or so from Ealing to St Pancras. From the A40 towards Paddington  Advertising hoarding just before the Marylebone flyover  The downside of London. I've never seen the traffic going nowhere on both sides of the road!  Edgware Road  Marylebone Flyover. Note the Vectra Driver refusing to close ranks.  BT Tower  Hackney Gasworks near the Regent's Canal  Broadway Market, Hackney.    Beck Street, Hackney. Nice to have a railway line instead of an attic. Not just any old line either. This one comes from Liverpool Street station.  This the battered Facade of a tower block on Great Eastern Street in the East End in between Spitalfields Market and Algate East.  and there you have it. I'll post more soon. |
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Dave
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Post by Dave on Jun 14, 2009 7:06:06 GMT
Yes I did and I love the ones you have put up and looking forward to your next batch. There are many pictures of the power station from inside and outside on the Urban Exploration Forum here is a link to the archived Battersea threads www.28dayslater.co.uk/forums/tags.php?tag=battersea |
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merse
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Post by merse on Jun 14, 2009 7:54:10 GMT
Next up we have some black and white shots I took whilst on my way into work last week during the London Underground strike. I can assure you that although I took these in my car I was perfectly stationary for at least a minute before and after taking each picture. It took me 2 hours 21 minutes to drive the 8 miles or so from Ealing to St Pancras.  I know it's bad Chris but two and a half hours is appalling. I won't bore people on here but if you want I'll let you have the "Merse patented traffic buster route" in from your part of town. I managed to do the Heston ~ Cavendish Square W1 run in a little over an hour and a half setting out at 7.am last week during the first day of the strike (Weds) using a route that runs parallel between the A40 and the A4 ~ and most of that hold up was incurred around Ealing Common and Shepherd's Bush Green which were really unavoidable even for a few hundred yards which is all I used them for. Mind you, I didn't get the time to take photos. I think your shots of the area around Chelsea Bridge and Broadway Market (where I used to live) are fantastic and would like to come back to them later in the day when all my family jobbies are done and dusted! |
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chelstongull
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Post by chelstongull on Jun 14, 2009 7:55:33 GMT
Fantastic pictures there Chris, gives you an insight into what it must be like to work and live in London. Loved the m&S advert ;D
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Post by capitalgull on Jun 14, 2009 9:24:48 GMT
There is a very similar m&S advert just before you get on to the M3 at Feltham that has already been blamed for a couple of accidents (minor thankfully) in the newly relaid section that somehow took eight months to sort out properly! As for one of the other pictures, it really takes me back to the first time I arrived in London all those 14 years ago, since the first place I worked was fairly near Beck Street and it was on that very thoroughfare that I went to look at my first shared 'digs' before deciding I was far better off down in Sidcup! I remember walking into the street obviously on the day the bins were due to be emptied, and it stank to high heaven. I hate to think what was in some of those bin bags that day, but I get the feeling it was a lucky escape for me, since I found out a few years later that Merse lived nearby at the time  |
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merse
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Post by merse on Jun 14, 2009 13:31:07 GMT
Advertising hoarding just before the Marylebone flyover Hackney Gasworks near the Regent's Canal Broadway Market, Hackney. Beck Street, Hackney. Nice to have a railway line instead of an attic. Not just any old line either. This one comes from Liverpool Street station. It's not the appendages on the poster that are the hazard, it's the tits who get distracted by them! Just to the right of that gas holder are some of the most desirous and expensive property conversions in London ~ loft living at it's best! There are plans afoot to emulate the similar ones for the Kings Cross Victorian Gas holders whereby there will be futuristic glass and steel condominiums constructed within the wrought iron fret work of the holders....................rather like living in an aquarium methinks! Broadway Market has a fascinating history being at the foot of London Fields which is where the old time drovers used to graze their cattle en route from the Essex Weald to slaughter and sale at Smithfield Market in the City. At the time Hackney was a small village and the names of the streets around the Market ~ Sheep Lane and Cat and Mutton Bridge give lie to the former pastoral history of the area.....................this was where the animals where "fattened up" again prior to being sold! When I lived adjacent to the market it had declined to such an extent that there was just one stall holder left......................Mike the fruit and veg man who now happily exists cheek by jowl with all the other traders in the thriving and charismatic little street featuring "The Best Pub in London" (in my opinion) The Dove which was dealing in the finest Belgian beers and home made food way before it ever became fashionable. Beck Road (to give it it's proper name) was featured in the film "Hope and Glory" set in war time London as the home of Cynthia Payne (Madam Lunch Voucher) on whom her early life was the basis of the film and a lot of "Lock, Stock; and Two Smoking Barrells" was filmed around here too and actually provided some nice "cash" work for me and my mates as unit drivers and general Dog's Bodies (one of whom actually got a part in the film and hasn't looked back since as he is now an actor rather than a bus driver!) Although my failed marriage and the acrimonious way in which it ended made it necessary to move away some years ago, E8, Mare Street, The Hackney Empire, The All Nations Club and London Fields complete with the Broadway and all it's characters will always be "home" to me and I retain several long standing friendships around there (some of them are the ones that got me into trouble in the first place ) ~ a special place is Hackney populated by special people ...................even if the bins smelt a bit that day Chas; you missed something making that decision not to live around there although I confess it's a million light years away from leafy Thames side Shepperton! |
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Deleted
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Post by Deleted on Jun 14, 2009 20:19:49 GMT
I've always loved the description of London as a "thousand villages". Here's me in one of those former hamlets - well off the main tourist trail - sometime in the early 1960s. Where was I?  |
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Dave
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Post by Dave on Jun 19, 2009 19:45:56 GMT
Chris one building I do have interest in London is the old Lesney factory, I expect that it is now gone, but it was still there only a few years ago. I collect royal coaches and my prize one is my 1953 large coronation coach, below is a short history of the factory and I would love to know if the Rifleman pub is still standing. Lesney was founded in 1947 as an industrial die-casting company by Leslie Smith (March 6, 1918 - May 26, 2005) and Rodney Smith. They had been school friends and served together in the Royal Navy during World War II. Rodney Smith introduced to his partner a man named John "Jack" Odell, an engineer he had met in a previous job at D.C.m.T. (another die-casting company). Mr. Odell initially rented a space in the Lesney building to make his own die-casting products, but he joined the company as a partner in that same year. Lesney originally started operations in a derelict pub in north London (The Rifleman), but later, as finances allowed, changed several location times before finally moving to a factory in Hackney which became synonymous with the company. In late 1947 they received a request for parts to a toy gun. As that proved to be a viable alternative to reducing their factory's output during periods in which they received fewer or smaller industrial orders, they started to make die cast model toys in the next year.  the first model toy they produced in 1948 — a die-cast road roller based clearly on a Dinky model (the industry leader in die-cast toy cars at that time) — proved also to be the first of perhaps three major milestones on the path to their eventual destiny. It established transportation as a viable and interesting theme; other similar models followed, including a cowboy-influenced covered wagon and a soap-box racer. a toy which Mr. Odell designed for his daughter: Her school only allowed children to bring toys that could fit inside a matchbox, so Mr. Odell crafted a scaled-down version of the Lesney green and red road roller. Based on the aforementioned size restriction, the idea was born to sell the model in a replica matchbox — thus also yielding the name of the series which would propel Lesney to worldwide, mass-market success. A period of great expansion, tremendous profit, and recognition followed: In 1966, Lesney received their first (of several) Queen's Award for Industry. By the mid-'60s, Matchbox was the largest brand of die-cast model vehicles in the world, and had diversified the line into multiple series. On July 11, 1982, after years of difficulties due to the economic climate in Britain at the time, Lesney went bankrupt and into receivership. Competing companies Mettoy (Corgi) and Meccano (Dinky) also suffered the same fate. The Matchbox brand as well as Lesney's tooling were bought by and became a division of Universal Holdings/Universal Toys, where the company re-formed as "Matchbox International Ltd." Tooling and production were moved to Macau.    |
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Post by merse on Jun 20, 2009 9:38:06 GMT
Some of you reading this forum might have unwittingly set eyes on this building or even played football beside it as it is located in Homerton Road, Hackney Wick E9[/color] separated by water from the legendary Hackney Marshes (the world's largest complex of grass football pitches ~ some 96 at it's peak) and where the Bamber's Right Foot side always play the Leyton Orientear prior to most games between the Gulls and the O's at Brisbane Road which in itself is right next to the far (Eastern boundary) of the marshes. The rapidly emerging Olympic Park is immediately to the South and the former home of Clapton Orient (Millfield Road) sits at the North West corner. The houses in the picture are built on another former part of the factory which although was the extension was demolished around twenty years ago and this road is Lee Conservancy Road ~ named after the navigable waterway of that name which also appears in the picture. The building currently stands mothballed and in my opinion holds no architectural merit although admittedly it does possess value from a heritage point of view. In it's last working days it was utilised by the group that owned it for the production of plumbing sundries (taps, plug holes, shower heads etc) taking advantage of the inherent skills of the work force and the tooling installed on the premises. I have several friends who live around there and indeed the sister of well known footballer Michael Duberry lives there. Lee Conservancy Road only has houses along one side (backing onto a very nice canal side walk) as on the other (Western side) lays Mabeley Green with it's own complex of football pitches and the scene of Danny Baker's excellent weekly series on Sunday football which was screened several years ago now. It is also the setting for one of London's peculiar phenomenons where hundreds of Africans gather on Sundays to watch improvised games (often of twenty + a side!) without proper pitch markings or goal posts (they aren't liable for rent that way ) played in the inimitable way that only Africans can play.........................eye watering skills, touch and imagination coupled with brutal tackling; and it is here that I first became aware of the "Legend" of one Adibayo Akinfenwa well over a decade ago, and many a professional and semi pro footballer has emerged from this anarchy! Indeed on the Marshes the best attended football is on Sunday afternoons when the Turkish Leagues kick off (and I do mean "kick off"!!!!). It's mad it's bad, but it's fun if you turn a blind eye to the sporadic violence and near criminal intimidation that Turks will travel from miles around to see. I was at one of their cup finals one evening played at the nearby Lee Bridge Road home of Leyton FC (in the days before this became a "Greek" club) when chairs, fencing and corner staves were all used as weapons of attack and self defence and so many police descended on the place that they were able to lock us all in and collect ID, names and addresses before we were allowed to go home!
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Dave
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Post by Dave on Jun 20, 2009 10:39:00 GMT
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merse
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Post by merse on Jun 20, 2009 16:39:35 GMT
That estate in the foreground is the Kingsmead Estate which has a population of some 8,ooo people believe it or not. As for those buses, the livery looks suspiciously like the old Manchester Corporation livery but I rather think they were part of some corporate push for Matchbox Toys. Until a couple of years ago I used to see a small scale American style truck complete with articulated unit parked on the premises that used to be used (I believe) for distributing Matchbox Toys around the country.
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merse
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Post by merse on Jun 20, 2009 16:48:19 GMT
I think London's absolutely magical at dusk or dawn and the views from or of the bridges are the very best of all. I particularly love the view either side of Waterloo Bridge but looking East as dawn breaks down river with the myriad of lights on the Docklands high rise in the distance is unsurpassable. Chelsea Bridge too at night has a magical quality and I think the three suspension bridges that straddle the Thames ~ Chelsea, Albert and Hammersmith are especially elegant. What nicer sight too than the location of Chelsea Bridge and Albert Bridge reaching out across the water from Battersea Park with the golden Buddha in the peace pagoda sitting sentinel between them and staring out towards Cheyne Walk?
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Post by Deleted on Jun 20, 2009 21:50:32 GMT
I think London's absolutely magical at dusk or dawn and the views from or of the bridges are the very best of all. I particularly love the view either side of Waterloo Bridge but looking East as dawn breaks down river with the myriad of lights on the Docklands high rise in the distance is unsurpassable. Chelsea Bridge too at night has a magical quality and I think the three suspension bridges that straddle the Thames ~ Chelsea, Albert and Hammersmith are especially elegant. What nicer sight too than the location of Chelsea Bridge and Albert Bridge reaching out across the water from Battersea Park with the golden Buddha in the peace pagoda sitting sentinel between them and staring out towards Cheyne Walk? There's a little book called Cross River Traffic - by a bloke with the unfortunate name of Chris Roberts - which gives a history of each of London's bridges. Not a classic, but half-decent nonetheless, and I managed to pick up a remaindered copy a while back in that cheapo bookshop on the crossroads by The Old Vic. |
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Dave
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Post by Dave on Jun 20, 2009 22:18:41 GMT
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Post by Deleted on Jun 20, 2009 22:53:23 GMT
Visiting relatives in W5 as a child I used to love that last bit along the Great West Road with all those Art Deco industrial buildings (some of which have been demolished). I've raided Geograph for some pictures along with a couple of interlopers. Suggested website if you're interested in "hidden" bits of London: www.hidden-london.com Along the Great West Road:    A few miles north on Western Avenue, the Hoover building (now a supermarket) :  And much further north on the Coast Road at Wallsend on Tyneside, the Wills building (now flats):  Also, a fleeting image I saw from the Cambridge-Liverpool Street train at some stage during the last two seasons (what, no trips to Cambridge next season?). Well, at least I think this is what I saw: flats in Upper Clapton which - from the train at least - struck me as vaguely Glaswegian tenement block-style in their appearance. Would that be fair or wide of the mark? Admittedly they appeared rather more severe from a distance than in this picture.  Incidently, where in England are these decidedly Glaswegian-looking buildings?  |
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