My posts about my walk around King’s Cross led by the Greater London Industrial Archeology Society on Saturday 8th April 1989 continues with this post. The previous post was Coal Drops and Canal Kings Cross 1989
A couple of the others on this GLIAS walk are on the right edge of this picture, which gives a good impression of the state of the building at the time with scattered rubbish in the foreground and a large pile of it in the distance. You can find more about the site in Peter Darley’s post on the Gasholder blog, from which much of the information here comes.
The Western Coal Drops were converted to become a part of the Western Goods Shed in 1897–99 when the timber viaduct which had been on their west side leading over the canal to Samuel Plimsoll’s coal shoots in Cambridge Road in 1886 was also rebuilt. (I think ‘shoot’ was simply an alternative spelling of ‘chute’.) Darley says that this iron on brick Plimsoll Viaduct was later dismantled and re-erected on their east side when the Western Goods Shed was built. I think this was at the north end of the Goods Shed at left and the Coal Drop roof at right.
Although this was taken over a barbed wire fence, the next pictures (one below) were made from the other side of this. I think at least this row of buildings from the original 1850s buildings although in part rebuilt. I don’t think these have survived in the redevelopment though I could be wrong.
Another picture from further down the yard in the image above.
We returned to the northern end of the Eastern Coal Drops where I think this shows the brickwork that once supported the two lines of rails. In the distance you can just see the tops of the Kings Cross gasholders.
This shows a ground level view of the ‘Berlin Bank’ viaduct seen in an image on my previous post at left and also on the right the viaduct for the Eastern Coal Drops. The area was still in use for storage and as you can see several vehicles were parked around in and between the arches.
Another view at ground level between the two coal drops, looking towards the Eastern Coal Drops.
For this picture I used flash to illuminate the brick arch which was only dimly lit. Beyond this the area of the actual coal drops was open above and illuminated by daylight.
The viaducts merged together at the northern end of the Coal Drops site.
This is now part of the restored building which can be seen from what is now called Stable Street. It was the last of the roughly 50 pictures I took inside the Kings Cross Goods Yard where I was able to benefit from the insights of several of the country’s leading industrial archaeologists before the GLIAS walk ended at the exit from the area on York Way.
From there I continued to wander unguided around the area to the north of Kings Cross and St Pancras stations, and I will continue with pictures from this in the next post in this series.
The first post on this walk was Kings Cross, St George’s Gardens & More