The Underground Map is creating street histories for the areas of London and surrounding counties lying within the M25.
In a series of maps from the 1750s until the 1950s, you can see how London grew from a city which only reached as far as Park Lane into the post-war megapolis we know today.
The aim of the project is to find the location every street in London, whether past or present. You are able to see each street on a present day map and also spot its location on older maps.
There's a control which looks like a 'pile of paper' at the top right of the map above. You can use it to see how an area has changed on a series of historic maps.
Queen Victoria Street, EC4V
Queen Victoria Street was built in 1861 to provide a more efficient approach to London’s central business district Queen Victoria Street is a London thoroughfare that runs east by north from its intersection with New Bridge Street and Victoria Embankment in the Castle Baynard ward of the City of London. It is named after Queen Victoria, who was the British monarch from 1837 to 1901. The street passes through the wards of Queenhithe and Bread Street before cutting through the middle of Cordwainer ward, eventually ending at Mansion House Street at Bank junction. Beyond Bank junction, the street continues as Threadneedle Street, which connects to Bishopsgate. Other nearby streets include Puddle Dock, Cannon Street, Walbrook, and Poultry.
The street was funded through the Metropolitan Improvement Act. It cost over £1,000,000 to construct and remains a significant street within the City of London. Queen Victoria Street was built over Old Pye Street and New Pye Street, which were named after Sir Robert Pye.
The closest London Underground stations to Queen Victoria Street a...
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Panton Street, SW1Y
Panton Street was named after Colonel Thomas Panton, local property dealer of the 17th century. Thomas Panton, who amassed a great fortune through gambling, made the decision to never gamble again. Instead, he used his wealth to purchase Shaver’s Hall, named after an incident involving Lord Dunbar who reportedly lost £3000 in a single sitting.
Despite its name, Shaver’s Hall was not a barbershop but rather a gambling hall located on the northeast corner of the Haymarket and Coventry Street, extending to what is now Panton Street.
Panton decided to demolish the gambling hall and build over it.
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Rotten Row, SW1X
Rotten Row is a corruption of route du roi. Rotten Row is a wide track that stretches for 1384 meters along the southern edge of Hyde Park, connecting Hyde Park Corner to Serpentine Road. In the 18th and 19th centuries, Rotten Row was a popular destination for wealthy Londoners to go horse riding, showcasing their status to others in high society.
Rotten Row has its origins in the late 17th century, when William III relocated the court to Kensington Palace and required a secure route to travel to St James’s Palace. To this end, he ordered the creation of a wide avenue that ran through Hyde Park, which was lit by 300 oil lamps in 1690. This was a notable innovation, as it was the first artificially lit highway in Britain. The lamps were installed as a safety measure to deter highwaymen, who were known to frequent the area at the time.
Originally named Route du Roi, which translates to King’s Road in French, the track’s name eventually became corrupted into ’Rotten Row’....
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Steve Biko Way, TW3
Steve Biko Way commemorates the South African anti-apartheid activist. Stephen Biko (1946 – 1977) was a South African anti-apartheid activist. His ideas were articulated in a series of articles published under the pseudonym Frank Talk.
In 1973, the South African government deemed Biko a subversive threat and imposed a banning order on him, which severely limited his activities. Despite this, Biko continued to be politically active and played a role in organising various community projects in the Ginsberg area, including a healthcare centre and a crèche. During this time, he received numerous anonymous threats and was detained by state security services on multiple occasions.
Biko was beaten to death by state security officers after being arrested in August 1977. His funeral was attended by over 20 000 people, reflecting the widespread impact of his activism and the deep mourning that his death provoked
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Westbourne Terrace Road, W2
Westbourne Terrace Road is a street located in Little Venice that connects Blomfield Road in the north and Westbourne Bridge in the south. The northern section of the road is a bridge that goes over the Paddington branch of the Grand Union Canal, which is commonly referred to as the Westbourne Terrace Road bridge. The road is intersected by Delamere Terrace and Warwick Crescent in the north, and Blomfield Mews can be found on its eastern side.
The majority of the houses on Westbourne Terrace Road were built between 1850 and 1855 and are characterised by their stucco mid-nineteenth century terraced design. Most of these houses are grade II listed by Historic England, indicating their historical and architectural significance.
Margery Allingham, a famous crime fiction writer who lived from 1904 to 1966, resided at number 1 on Westbourne Terrace Road from 1916 to 1926. A green plaque has been installed to commemorate her time there.
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White City Estate
The 50-acre White City Estate was built in 1938-1939 on the former White City Exhibition Grounds. Between the wars the 1908 White City Exhibition Grounds and its pavilions were trending towards dereliction. In 1935, part of it was purchased by the London County Council for housing development. The White City Estate was the largest LCC estate to that date. The housing blocks are laid out in a grid, surrounded by grass with numerous mature London plane trees, which predate the buildings.
Commonwealth Avenue, Australia Road, India Way, South Africa Road, and other roads and blocks in the White City estate were named in connection with the exhibition and the empire. The architects were praised for their decision to separate the kitchens from the living areas and for including bathrooms. However, tenants expressed a preference for the traditional "parlour" and were unimpressed with the monotonous layout of the estate.
By the 1970s, a significant portion of White City had fallen into disrepair.
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Barry Road, SE22
Barry Road links Peckham and Dulwich. It is named after Charles Barry and is said to be exactly one mile long. Barry designed Dulwich Park, to which the road leads. Westerfield Road became Barry Road in 1867.
Sir Charles Barry was a prominent British architect of the 19th century, and is best known for his work on the Palace of Westminster. He was born in London in 1795 and trained as an architect under the guidance of his father, who was also an architect.
Barry’s most famous work was the rebuilding of the Palace of Westminster, which had been severely damaged by a fire in 1834. Along with his collaborator Augustus Pugin, Barry designed the new Gothic Revival-style palace, which incorporated many of the original features of the building, such as Westminster Hall.
Barry was also responsible for many other notable buildings throughout his career, including the Manchester Art Gallery, the Royal College of Surgeons in London, and the Halifax Town Hall. He was a proponent of ...
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Decapod Street, E15
Decapod was a locomotive at the GER’s Stratford works. he Decapod locomotive was a massive machine built by the Great Eastern Railway in 1903. It was designed to haul heavy goods trains and was initially intended for use on the company’s mainline between London and Norwich.
The locomotive was given the classification "S69" by the Great Eastern Railway and was numbered 800. It was a tank engine, which means that its water and fuel were carried in tanks mounted on the locomotive itself, rather than in a separate tender. The Decapod had ten driving wheels arranged in a "0-10-0" configuration, which means that it had no leading or trailing wheels, and all of its weight was carried by its ten driving wheels.
Contrary to the myths and misconceptions that have grown up around it, the Decapod was not a failure or a disaster. In fact, it was a highly successful locomotive that performed well in service for many years. It was capable of hauling trains of up to 1,500 tons, and it was used extensively on the Great ...
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Lamb’s Conduit Street, WC1N
Lamb’s Conduit Street takes its name from Lambs Conduit - a dam across a tributary of the River Fleet. Lamb’s Conduit Street was named in honour of William Lambe, who generously donated £1500 to rebuild the Holborn Conduit in 1564. The Conduit - a large cistern - was supplied with water from a dam across a tributary of the River Fleet.
Lambe - who hailed from Kent - noticed a spring in Holborn "where there was spring water as clear as crystal".
The water was carried through a network of lead pipes from these northern fields for more than two thousand yards.
The water was distributed to the Snow Hill area. Lambe also provided 120 pails to help poor women earn a living by selling the water. The tributary flowed from west to east along the north side of Long Yard, followed the curved path of Roger Street, and joined the Fleet near Mount Pleasant. This made it the boundary between the Ancient Parishes of Holborn to the south and St Pancras to the north.
However, the New River, which opened in 1613, led to a decline in the ...
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Ladbroke Grove, W11
Ladbroke Grove is the main street in London W11. The story of the first, southern part of Ladbroke Grove dates back to the 1820s.
The Ladbroke family owned a large portion of the area, including holdings in Kensington. In 1821, James Weller, the family’s nephew, inherited the estate and was required to change his name to James Weller Ladbroke according to his uncle’s will. He initiated a project to develop the area with Victorian townhouses for the gentry.
Over fifty years, from 1821 to the mid-1870s, a unique layout was created in the area through the efforts of half a dozen architects and numerous speculators. Ladbroke was initially restricted by his uncle’s will to grant leases of up to twenty-one years, but a private Act of Parliament in 1821 allowed him to grant ninety-nine-year leases. Ladbroke’s surveyor, Allason, was then granted leases in 1824 and 1827.
Allason’s first task was to prepare a plan for the layout of the estate, which presented a unique ...
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Kenway Road, SW5
Kenway Road was originally called North Row. Kenway Road was originally part of a country track linking the Manor House at Earl’s Court with Kensington village, via what are now Wright’s Lane and Marloes Road. It may be an abbreviation of ’the Way to Kensington’.
In 1797, one Thomas Smith bought a local piece of land called ’Pound Field. At Earl’s Court Smith began building in 1803 along established thoroughfares - today’s Kenway Road and Hogarth Place.
In 1856, Charles William Wallgrave (of King’s Road, Chelsea) invested in a plot of land at Earl’s Court. Four years later he decided to build Wallgrave Road but wrote to the local Parish Vestry to say that the drains at Earl’s Court appeared to be blocked, since all the sewage from the cottages in Kenway Road was overflowing onto his ground. The vestry replied that this was not surprising, since there were no sewers at Earl’s Court. Nor did they intend to do anything ab...
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George Lane, E18
George Lane is the main road of South Woodford. South Woodford’s original name was Church End. This continued as the electoral ward for the part of South Woodford north of the Central Line railway.
There were five inns in Woodford in 1753: The George, The White Hart, The Ship and Castle, New Wells, and Old Wells. The George at Church End, already existed as Horns Inn in 1657. It faces High Road at the junction with George Lane - the road is named after the inn.
In the early 19th century, the upper and lower roads of Woodford, together with Snakes Lane and George Lane were the only thoroughfares through the parish.
George Lane originally crossed the railway with a level crossing immediately to the north of the station. This was closed and the road split into two when the line was electrified.
The first cinema in the district was the South Woodford Cinema, opening in 1913 at 170 George Lane.
George Lane station became a Central Line underground station ...
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Agincourt Road, NW3
Agincourt Road dates from 1881. Thomas E. Gibb, a developer from Kentish Town, purchased a large area of land and proposed to build 120 small houses for middle-class residents (at ’the lower end of middle-class respectability’), as well as a sewer. He laid out several roads, including Cressy Road, Agincourt Road, and Lisburne Road - Agincourt and Cressey were both notable battles.
However, the closure and reopening of a local smallpox hospital caused land values to decrease, and little housing was built initially.
In 1886, the Church Commissioners recognised the social change and allowed Gibb to build 215 houses on the remaining land. This led to the construction of Constantine Road in 1887, which provided a direct route from Gospel Oak and Kentish Town to South End Green and the heath. Building then began, and after Gibb’s death in 1894, his successors built an additional 153 houses in Constantine Road, Cressy Road, and Mackeson Road.
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The Adelphi
The Adelphi is a small district surrounding the streets of Adelphi Terrace, Robert Street and John Adam Street. The Adelphi district gets its name from the Adelphi Buildings, a collection of 24 neoclassical terrace houses located between The Strand and the River Thames in the parish of St Martin in the Fields. The buildings were constructed between 1768-72 by the Adam brothers (John, Robert, James, and William Adam) and also included a headquarters building for the "Society for the encouragement of Arts, Manufactures, and Commerce," now known as the Royal Society of Arts. The Greek-derived name of the buildings honors the Adam brothers’ architectural design. The ruins of Durham House were removed to make way for the Adelphi Buildings. The nearby Adelphi Theatre takes its name from the Adelphi Buildings. Robert Adam was inspired by his visit to Diocletian’s Palace in Dalmatia, and some of that inspiration is reflected in the design of the Adelphi Buildings.
The Adelphi district is not strictly defined by boundaries, but generally, it is considered to be situated betwee...
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Ainsty Street, SE16
York Street until 1873, Ainsty Street was one of a group of Rotherhithe Streets commemorating royal names. Built in the early 19th century, York Street - before it was Ainsty Street - was named for George III’s second son, the Duke of York.
It was typical of many other streets of workers’ terraces.
Destroyed in the Blitz, Ainsty Street originally ran to what is now Albatross Way. It was redeveloped when the Ainsty Estate was built.
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Oakwood
The area of Oakwood derives its name from Oakwood Park which opened in 1927. Oakwood Park, which Southgate Council had purchased, was named after Oak Lodge, which stood in the grounds.
The arrival at Oakwood of the Piccadilly line resulted in both the construction of the grade II* listed Oakwood station and the start of a building boom. Builders Laing and George Reed bought much of the surrounding land for development and estates began to develop. Prior to development, the only major building in the area had been South Lodge - one of the four lodges of Enfield Chase.
Oakwood station opened on 13 March 1933 as part of the Piccadilly line extension, the original name being Enfield West. The station served as the line’s terminus for a brief period before Cockfosters station was opened.
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Northumberland Avenue, WC2N
Northumberland Avenue runs from Trafalgar Square in the west to the Thames Embankment. In 1608–09, Henry Howard, 1st Earl of Northampton built a house on the eastern side of the former Chapel and Hospital of St. Mary Rounceval, at Charing Cross, including gardens running to the River Thames and adjoining Scotland Yard to the west. The estate became the property of Algernon Percy, 10th Earl of Northumberland when he married Howard’s great-great niece, Lady Elizabeth, in 1642, whereupon it was known as Northumberland House.
In June 1874, the whole of Northumberland House was purchased by the Metropolitan Board of Works and demolished to form Northumberland Avenue, which would accommodate hotels. The road was part built on the parallel Northumberland Street.
Contemporary planning permissions forbade hotels to be taller than the width of the road they were on; consequently Northumberland Avenue was built with a wide carriageway. Part of the parallel Northumberland Street was demolished in order to make way for the avenue’s eastern...
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Aldgate
Aldgate was one of the massive gates which defended the City from Roman times until 1760. Stow wrote in his Survey of London of 1598 that "It hath had two pair of gates, though now but one; the hooks remaineth yet. Also there hath been two port-closes; the one of them remain"
The gate stood at the corner of the modern Duke’s Place and was always an obstacle to traffic. It was rebuilt between 1108–47, again in 1215, and reconstructed completely between 1607-09. The gate was finally removed in 1761; it was temporarily re-erected at Bethnal Green.
While he was a customs official, from 1374 until 1386, Geoffrey Chaucer occupied apartments above the gate. The Augustinians priory of Holy Trinity Aldgate was founded by Matilda, the wife of King Henry I, in 1108, on ground just inside the gate.
Within Aldgate ward, Jews settled from 1181, until their expulsion in 1290 by King Edward I. The area became known as Old Jewry. Jews were welcomed back by Oliver Cromwell, and once again they settled in the area, founding London’s ...
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Elm Close, HP6
Elm Close is a complex cul-de-sac lying off Hill Avenue. Elm Close was designed by J.H. Kennard for the Amersham Public Utility Society.
30 semi-detached houses were built here using a state subsidy. The houses were built from concrete blocks, cast on site.
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Westbourne Grove, W11
Westbourne Grove is one of the main roads of Notting Hill. Westbourne Grove runs from Kensington Park Road in the west to Queensway in the east, crossing over Portobello Road. It contains a mixture of independent and chain retailers.
Westbourne Grove’s development commenced in the 1840s, progressing from its eastern end located in Bayswater to the west, ultimately becoming the primary route from east to west into the Ladbroke Estate. The area situated at the far west end of the street only acquired the name Westbourne Grove in 1938, formerly being referred to as Archer Street. The remaining part of the street was Westbourne Grove West for some time. Additionally, Westbourne Gardens became part of Westbourne Grove in 1866.
In 1929, A.J. Cronin, a renowned novelist, launched his own medical practice at 152 Westbourne Grove.
Westbourne Grove ultimately takes its name from Westbourne Green - a settlement that developed to the west of the bourne that later took the name River Westbourne.
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Replingham Road, SW18
Replingham Road was built in the 1890s and 1900s as part of the ’Southfields Grid’. The area had been an expanse of meadows and market gardens, owned by Augusta Beaumont - a member of the temperance movement.
In 1889, the first trains travelled along the newly-extended Putney Bridge to Wimbledon railway line. The frequency of District Railway trains improved greatly with electrification. Over the following decade, builders George Ryan and Henry Penfold began constructing The Grid where a new three-bedroom home would typically cost £325.
There were no pubs in the first period as Augusta Beaumont drew up a restrictive covenant when she sold the land for development.
St Barnabas Church was consecrated in 1908.
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Kilburn Park Farm
Kilburn Park Farm was situated almost opposite the Red Lion along the Edgware Road. The farm buildings can be seen in a sketch dated 1865 which says that a farm lay "nearly opposite the ’Old Red Lion’ Edgware Road, Paddington, and immediately adjoining Verry’s Brewery." The path seen in front of the barn led on to Willesden.
The areas of Kilburn on the Willesden side of the Edgware Road belonged to the manors of Bounds, Brondesbury and Mapesbury - they were all the property of St Paul’s Cathedral.
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Kentish Town
Kentish Town is first recorded during the reign of King John (1208) as Kentisston. By 1456 Kentish Town was recognised as a thriving hamlet, and in this period a chapel of ease is recorded as being built for the inhabitants.
The early 19th century brought a lot of modernisation, causing a lot of the area’s rural charm, the River Fleet and the 18th century buildings to vanish.
Large amounts of land were purchased to build the first railway through the area, which can still be seen today. Kentish Town was a prime site for development as the Kentish Town Road was the main route for the growing city of London to the South.
1877 saw the beginning of mission work in the area as it was, by then, poor. The mission first held their services outside but as their funding increased they built a mission house, chapel, and vicarage.
In 1912 the Church of St Silas the Martyr was finally erected and consecrated, and by December of that year it became a parish in its own right.
Kentish Town was to s...
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Salmon Lane, E14
Salmon Lane skirts the northern edge of Limehouse. Salmon Lane is an old road in Limehouse which has been a public highway since at the latest the 15th century. The road was once called Sermon Lane, the latter as it was the principal route from Limehouse to Stepney parish church.
According to the book Without the City Walls, Hector Bolitho and Derek Peel, at was named after Captain Robert Salmon, Master of Trinity House at the time of the Spanish Armada.
It long had a market and was the location of a warehouse storing imported turtles. They were brought straight from the docks, and from here many London firms furnishing the City and the West End with calipash and calipee were supplied.
From 1907, future director Alfred Hitchcock lived at 175 Salmon Lane when his father become a fishmonger there.
Salmon Lane Lock is on the Regent’s Canal. A new footbridge at the lock was completed in 2005 connecting Salmon Lane to Parnham Street.
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Burnley Road, NW10
Burnley Road runs parallel with the tracks of the Metropolitan/Jubilee line, to the north of them. Burnley Road is the location for the northern entrance of Dollis Hill station, opened by the Metropolitan Railway in 1909. The station last served the Met. in 1940. The Bakerloo ran its services there from 1939 to 1979 and thereafter by the Jubilee Line.
In 1901, a new public park was created - the 35 hectares of Gladstone Park.
Between the park and the underground station, Edwardian terraced houses were built on a grid with names starting with letters in alphabetical order (with some letters missing) from Aberdeen to Normanby.
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Old Welsh Harp
The Old Welsh Harp was a famous inn beside the Edgware Road. As a result of an Act of Parliament, the company running the Brent Reservoir acquired more land. An increase in traffic on the Regent’s Canal had meant that more water was required to replace the loss from its locks.
The land was used to increase the height of the dam and the reservoir’s area expanded to 400 acres by 1854. The reservoir works included raising a new embankment to protect from flooding a tavern called the Old Welsh Harp which was situated just north of the Brent Bridge.
The pub may have been already existed as the ’Harp and Horn’ by 1751 but had become the Welsh Harp by 1803. It was also known as the Lower Welsh Harp.
In 1858 the lease of the Old Welsh Harp was taken over by William Warner of Blackbird Farm in Kingsbury. He created a large pleasure gardens behind the pub and obtained the rights to use the reservoir for recreational purposes. For the following 30 years the ’Welsh Harp’ becam...
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Pickering Place, SW1A
Thought to be the smallest public open space in London, Pickering Place is perhaps most famous for being the location of the last public duel in England. The courtyard still contains original gaslights and has an unspoilt Georgian feel. In the 18th century this square was notorious for its gambling dens, bear baiting and duels. Rumour has it that Beau Brummel, close friend to King George IV, once fought here.
Berry Brothers and Rudd, located here, is thought to be Britain’s oldest wine and spirit merchant, having traded from the same shop for over 300 years. Berry’s was established in 1698 by the Widow Bourne, whose son-in-law, James Pickering built Picking Court as it was then known in 1731.
Pickering Place was the final location for the embassy of the Republic of Texas. The Republic of Texas then covered modern-day Texas as well as parts of New Mexico, Oklahoma, Kansas, Colorado and Wyoming and existed from 1836 to 1846 when it was annexed by the United States.
Other residents have been the author Graham Greene who kept a set of rooms overlooking the courtyard and Lord Palmers...
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Lillington Gardens Estate
Lillington Gardens is an estate in the Pimlico area, constructed in phases between 1961 and 1980. Lillington Gardens was among the last of the high-density public housing schemes built in London during the postwar period, and is referred to as one of the most distinguished.
Notably, seven years before the Ronan Point disaster ended the dominance of the tower block, Lillington Gardens looked ahead to a new standard that achieved high housing density within a medium rather than high-rise structure. It emphasised individuality in the grouping of dwellings, and provided for private gardens at ground and roof levels.
The estate’s high build quality, and particularly the planted gardens of its wide ’roof streets’, blend sympathetically with the surrounding Victorian terraces.
The estate’s high quality design was acknowledged by a Housing Design Award (1961), Ministry of Housing and Local Government Award for Good Design (1970), RIBA Award (1970) and RIBA Commendation (1973). Nikolaus Pevsner described it in 1973 as "th...
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Morden Hall Park
Morden Hall Park is a 21-hectare National Trust park situated around the banks of the River Wandle. Morden Hall Park is situated around the banks of the River Wandle.
Hinting at its former ’leats’ (small mill river channels), the Wandle splits into various branches spanned here by numerous footbridges. The estate contains Morden Hall itself and various outbuildings. The western part of the park hosts the National Trust’s only Garden Centre.
The owner Gilliat Edward Hatfield left the core of the house and its estate to the National Trust when he died in 1941.
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Hughes Mansions, E1
Hughes Mansions originally consisted of three roughly similar blocks containing 93 flats spread over the three buildings. Hughes Mansions had been completed in 1929 as a replacement of the back-to-back houses originally here. They were named after Mary Hughes, a Quaker philanthropist and member of the Metropolitan Borough of Stepney’s Housing Committee.
On 27 March 1945, a V2 rocket was fired towards London from remaining German forces in the Haagse Bos area of The Hague, Netherlands. The missile hit the very centre of the Hughes Mansions, totally destroying the centre block in the process. It was the final Second World War bomb to fall on London.
Hughes Mansions was rebuilt after the war and some of those who survived the V2 incident were rehoused here.
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The Underground Map is creating street histories for the areas of London and surrounding counties lying within the M25.
