Station Area, Leicester LE2

Image: © David Hallam-Jones Taken: 5 May 2013

Conduit Street is the home to these industrial units on the left and the Central Mosque. The foundation stone of this Islamic complex was laid in August 1988 and phased developments on the site have continued apace since then. Conduit Street takes its name from the establishment of Leicester's first piped water supply in 1645. A water conduit constructed of lead brought fresh water from a spring or springs in St. Margaret's Field, down Conduit Street to the Saturday market on the site of the present Market Place. Here it was stored in a cistern that was enclosed in an octagonal brick structure with a pointed slated roof. The latter was dismantled in 1841 and replaced by a memorial column, surmounted by a lamp. In 1852, the column was replaced by a bronze statue of the fifth Duke of Rutland, which had a water tap in its pedestal. The conduit was finally disconnected in 1855 after the Leicester Waterworks Company began providing a piped water supply to Leicester from a reservoir at Thornton.

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