IIa (ish)

[secretlondon]

It's now the 27th and I haven't done any of the walks I'd intended to. I think I'll have to run into July.

I went to have a blood test and on the way back sat in a quiet pub having a half. I thought - why don't I do a flan home? The pub I was in, the Bear, is on Camberwell Station Road, and has a railway viaduct passing outside. However there is no station - weird! It was also previously called the station tavern.

There was a station of course, it closed in 1916, or 1964 if you consider goods traffic. Thameslink trains now go past, but they don't stop.

I decided my flan would be to walk the route between two stations, neither of which are there any more. Camberwell station (1862-1916) to Walworth Road station (1863-1916).




The railway is on a raised viaduct and arches are being used for industry. It wasn't possible to get that close and I spent more time on Camberwell Road than I would have liked.

The route involved several repurposed pubs - photos below.



Railway bridges have codes. I can see that it is easier in case of a bridge strike to say its bridge HHH 371 2m 42ch than to describe which bridge over which road. However the code needs decoding.


Imperial Gardens, former night club on Camberwell New Road next to the viaduct. It closed when flats were built next door.



Camberwell Islamic Centre. A Nigerian mosque, in a former estate pub on Camberwell Road.


The Duke of Clarence, Camberwell Road, now Christ Apostolic Church.

Walworth Road station left no mark, but a block of flats on John Ruskin Street was built on the site of the Station Tavern, which closed in the 1990s, long after the station.


Further down the road there is this - the remains of a pub which was between John Ruskin Street and Grosvenor Terrace. Now residential.

Comments

[secretlondon]

Railway codes are http://www.railwaycodes.org.uk/ELRs/ELR0.shtm
http://www.railwaycodes.org.uk/ELRs/_mileages/H/HHH.txt

HHH is the Holborn viaduct (Blackfriars) and Herne Hill line.

The distance is given as miles and chains, I think from Holborn viaduct. It doesn't seem to fit with the website though.

[nou]

The website has Walworth Road Station at 2m 20ch and Camberwell Station at 3m 03ch — is the bridge not between those two points? Or is it the proportional distance that doesn't seem to fit?

Do you know what the “371” means?

[secretlondon]

The sign is 2m 42ch which does put it between Walworth Road and Camberwell. Yesterday I'm sure this didn't make sense but I'm not sure what my issue was.

I think the 371 may just be the number of the bridge. https://www.ianvisits.co.uk/blog/2014/02/23/where-is-the-first-railway-bridge-out-of-london/ seems to fit with that. Some examples don't have numbers (http://www.railwaycodes.org.uk/ELRs/ELR_on_bridge.jpg https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Engineers_line_reference#/media/File:Bridge_miles_and_chains.jpg) but these are all outside London. Perhaps there is another sign in both these cases.

That site has some amazing data. I'm particularly taken by LN150 a line from "Flyover East Junction to Decoy North Junction". Is that a real junction or just a decoy?

[nou]

Bridge numbers look worryingly collectable — I think I may have to start a new project of photographing them.

[secretlondon]

They are very mappable. Lots of lovely data. I considered adding them to openstreetmap.

You could make a map of bridge numbers as they radiate out of London terminals and draw the route of HHH and similar

[secretlondon]

http://www.semgonline.com/structures/numbering.html

[nou]

Reminds me of London Postcode Macros.

[nou]

Oh, and look what I found! A Flickr group dedicated to collecting them.

[nanila]

I love that last sign. The detailing and fonts are exquisite!