Old Kent Road
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
- See also: A2 road
Old Kent Road is a road in South East London, England and forms part of Watling Street, the Roman road which ran from Dover to Holyhead. Chaucer's pilgrims travelled along this route from London and Southwark on their way to Canterbury. Although the name appears as simply "Old Kent Road" on maps, it is usually referred to by Londoners as "the Old Kent Road". The Old Kent Road runs from the Bricklayers' Arms roundabout, where it meets the New Kent Road, Tower Bridge Road, and Great Dover Street, to New Cross. It is regarded as forming the boundary between Walworth and Peckham to the south and Bermondsey to the north although the ancient parish and vestry boundaries of these do not in fact coincide with it. The Old Kent Road also has a large number of large retail shops along it. Including Asda, Tesco, Currys, B&Q and others. The eastern entrance to Burgess Park is also located there.
The road once gave it's name to a railway station Old Kent Road near New Cross which closed in 1917.
[edit] Cultural References
- The street is famous as the cheapest property on the London Monopoly board and as the only one in South London.
- Old Kent Road is the title of a song by London-based indie pop group Pipas.
- In A Little Princess Shirley Temple sings a song titled Knocked 'em in the Old Kent Road by Albert Chevalier, of which the chorus gives a good idea of the sort of language that was used in the area:
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- "Wot cher!" all the neighbours cried
- "Who yer gonna meet, Bill
- Have yer bought the street, Bill"?
- Laugh? — I thought I should've died
- Knocked 'em in the Old Kent Road! [1]
- It's also mentioned in the Girls Aloud song "Long Hot Summer," and the Bananarama song "Middle of Nowhere," both written by production outfit Xenomania.
- The street is juxtaposed against Park Lane as a potential place of reference in Nick Hornby's book, High Fidelity.
