IMAGES TAKEN NEAR TO
Thorold Road, ILFORD, IG1 4EZ

It is currently run by Bombardier

Whilst walking home from work on Thursday night I noticed this single slam door carriage, still in its original British Rail livery, being loaded onto a low-loader at the entrance to Bombardier Ilford Train Maintenance Depot, presumably to be taken for scrap. A building has been demolished, which looks to have been done to make way for Crossrail maintenance facilities, as some signs which have been placed on some nearby lamp posts indicate. Looking south-southeast.

This area is near to the busy centre of Ilford, but probably not the subject of many photographs. Despite this, it has much to geograph : ordinary suburban houses, car parks, flats and run-down small shops and businesses.

This is a view of the 110-year-old Main building of Christchurch Primary School from Wellesley Road - I was lucky enough to witness its centenary in 2000! View taken looking south-southeast.

The sign round the corner at the Balfour Road entrance reads Christchurch Children's Centre, as opposed to Christchurch Primary School, the other large building on the site Image

The Dane building now houses the Teacher's Centre, but in the early 20th century it was Dane Primary School - a separate school from Christchurch, meaning that were two separate schools on one premises! My father and grandfather were educated here, my grandfather in the 1930s and 1940s and my father in the 1950s and 1960s. The building in the foreground on the right is the site manager's house. View taken looking south from Wellesley Road.

Everything in this photograph (save for the modern junction box at the bottom of the image) is 110 years old. If this were black and white, I'd forgive you for thinking this was taken in the 1900s! This is the rear of the Dane building and the side of the site manager's house. View taken looking south.

This view reminds me of the aerial views over rooftops you get in the title sequence of Coronation Street! Looking north-northeast. My primary school, Christchurch, on Christchurch Road can be seen in the centre of the image.

The distinctive black minaret of Christchurch Primary School can be seen from a handful of streets on the Commonwealth Estate (so named as all the streets are named after cities from the Commonwealth countries). I attended Christchurch from 1994 to 2002, and so this was the view that greeted me on my walk up to the school every morning for 8 years - it hasn't changed one bit! I was also lucky enough to be there at the time when it celebrated its centenary in 2000. This is the view from Wellesley Road, looking southwest towards Ilford town centre.

Here's a closer, unobstructed view of the site manager's house on Wellesley Road, looking south.