Original sign for the Magic Roundabout, 1982, then called County Islands

Image: © Colin Busby Forward Taken: 1 Feb 1982

Taken in February 1982, this is a photo of one of the original road signs at the approach to the Magic Roundabout in Swindon. The roundabout was then named County Islands, being next to the County Ground football stadium, but was eventually officially re-named the Magic Roundabout after being called that for years by locals who had to negotiate it. The present name is a reference to a children's TV programme. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Magic_Roundabout All five original signs were designed and made by Colin Forward, who worked at the Swindon Borough Council workshop in Barnfield Road. He told me how difficult it had been because of course in those days the design was done without the aid of computers and involved a lot of careful measurement to make the separate panels of the signs line up exactly. The letters were pre-cut, but the other features had to be cut by hand and were then printed on metal using a heat process.

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