Ravensthorpe Gyratory

Introduction

The photograph on this page of Ravensthorpe Gyratory by Humphrey Bolton as part of the Geograph project.

The Geograph project started in 2005 with the aim of publishing, organising and preserving representative images for every square kilometre of Great Britain, Ireland and the Isle of Man.

There are currently over 7.5m images from over 14,400 individuals and you can help contribute to the project by visiting https://www.geograph.org.uk

Ravensthorpe Gyratory

Image: © Humphrey Bolton Taken: 14 Nov 2005

The A644 through Ravensthorpe is notorious for its rush-hour traffic jams. It is a trunk road shoe-horned into a Victorian street. The traffic lights at the staggered crossroads in the centre of the town were the major cause of congestion, and this has been eased a little by the demolition of building on the north side and the construction of a bone-shaped traffic island. The building on the corner with the free-standing pediment has inscribed on the latter '1905 / Central Buildings'. Ravensthorpe looks like a Danish name, but is a Victorian invention as the town did not exist until the second half of the 19C (it was mostly fields in part of Mirfield). It then grew rapidly and became an Urban District Council in 1894, but was swallowed up by Dewsbury in 1910.

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