Bird's Eye View of Finsbury Park Town Centre, c 1900

Comment by StephenBln on July 3, 2016 at 11:19

This photo shows the 1889-1965 boundary of the Counties of London and Middlesex (Previous to 1889, Islington and Stoke Newington had also been part of Middlesex ).

The photo was taken shortly after the electrification of the lines from Finsbury Park to Wood Green via Harringay and to Edmonton via Tottenham on 22 July 1904 - These lines had been steam (1885-1891) and horse (1891-1904) operated.

A very interesting photograph that shows two electric trams working on the Middlesex lines to the north, as well as two horse operated trams of the North Metropolitan Tramways (later part of the L.C.C. system) to the south. At this time the two systems were not connected with no through service and a journey from say, Holloway or Camden Town to Harringay, would require a change of tram at Finsbury Park.  A line passengers from a just arrived NMT tram can be seen heading to the MET tram in order to continue their journeys north.

Interestingly, one tram has just come out of the depot (on the left) and is standing on the (wrong track) just before crossing the points to travel south. The tram with the Milkmaid advert has just arrived and needs to wait for the other to cross over to the right tracks. The tram in the middle is just arriving and is perhaps waiting for the crowds to disperse, before letting down it's passengers. The track is a dead end stump and the points to reverse back into the depot can clearly be seen. The MET track is further over to the right on the road and not yet connected to the NMT system. Over the following ten years, the services were all electrified, numbered into two systems (LCC & MET), being later joined with through running introduced and then in 1913 all renumbered again into the LCC system, 21, 27, 29, 59, 79, some of which still survive in today's 221, 29, 259 & 279 services.

The depot and the separate electric and horse trams can be more cle...:

Comment by Michele on April 1, 2018 at 23:28

Smart in those days then? Where the flag is on left hand side is what used to be a theatre before it was vacant for years and then became Rowans and Lidle's

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