the cabbies capital

I learnt a lot of stuff doing the knowledge. 10,000+ “points of interest“, 700+ separate routes crossing the Capital, then thousands of “point to point“ questions until you finally get that map of London lodged in your head and a nice shiny green badge from the PCO. Much of that vital information (Burton Tailor Mosaic, E14?) has sadly been lost from my brain, “if you don’t use it you lose it”, pretty much sums up what happens once you get out there and do the job. But what I do remember from all those miles on a moped, are the areas of London I’d never visited before, and certain roads that just seemed to be forgotten about and nearly empty. I ended up in places called De Beavoir Town, Hornsey Vale and Brownswood Park, none of which had registered during my previous 34 years of living in London.

So today, I am taking you to Queensbridge Road, E8. It’s a great road, and will take you from Hackney Road to Dalston Lane in about 30 seconds flat. Running parralel, and to the east of, Kingsland Road (in itself a mighty thorourfare that is underused) it even forms part of a knowledge Blue Book run, Church Road, E10 to Dunloe St, E2. But every time I’ve been back that way since it’s always empty. Admittedly cab journeys to the Hackney and/or Dalston direction are rarer than a Flaurent Malouda tackle, so I can’t admit to seeing the road at all times of the day and night. But the photos I took yesterday morning should give you some idea of how quiet Queensbridge Road normally is. But this is not meant as a slight on Queensbridge Roads pedigree, far from it. To my eyes it is a gem of a road that not only does it’s job very well, but has a little bit of something about it too. You can access the eastern stretch of the Regent’s Canal from here and follow it all the way down to Limehouse, where you see stuff like this;

Follow the road north and you get to Dalston where, tucked away in Ashwin St, E8 is one of my favourite buidlings. The link will take you to my Flickr page with more photos, but below is one of the Reeves & Sons building. At the risk of increasing Queensbridge Roads popularity to the point where cars might actually drive down it, I heartily recommend a visit, if only for the joy of getting out of second gear on a London road.