IMAGES TAKEN NEAR TO
Fisher Industrial Estate, Wiggenhall Road, WATFORD, WD18 0FE

The DC electric loop through Watford High Street crosses.

The railway from Watford to Rickmansworth (Church Street) through Watford High Street station was originally opened in 1862 and subsequently taken over in 1881 by the London & North Western Railway (LNWR). However it was not until some fifty years later, and just before the start of the First World War, that the LNWR built the connecting lines between Bushey and Watford High Street stations and between Bushey and Rickmansworth (Church Street) stations, creating a triangular junction in the process. This bridge carries the last surviving section of these railways and the junction, between Bushey and Watford High Street stations, over Lammas Road. The No Waiting road signs define the parking restrictions in place whenever the Watford Stadium at Vicarage Road is in use for match days.

Thirteen years after its closure in 1996 and the trackwork of the Croxley Green branch line from Watford High Street station is still in situ, just visible in the snow bottom right in this view taken from the Wiggenhall Road bridge. There has been a railway here since 1862 when the branch line from Watford Junction to Rickmansworth was built. Around fifty years later the London & North Western Railway built a branch line off the Rickmansworth line to Croxley Green. Forty years after that, in 1952, the Rickmansworth branch was closed to passenger traffic, and in 1967 freight services ceased too, and the track was cut back to the junction with the Croxley Green branch.

These terraced houses almost certainly date from around the Edwardian period as they are not shown on the Ordnance Survey's map of 1899 but are shown on the 1920 edition. This area of Watford is known as Colney Butts. To pinpoint the time that this photograph was taken it coincided precisely with the roar that went up from nearby Image when John Eustace scored a 59th minute equalizer for Watford against Ipswich Town. Watford went on to win 2-1.

Looking towards the car park

Located outside the former Church of St James each panel of the War Memorial records the names of about twenty men who gave their lives in the First World War. This is an extraordinary number when you consider the comparatively small size of the neighbourhood of terraced houses that would have existed at that time.

The street name is likely to be related to the Cannon Brewery of Benskin's that was formerly nearby. I suspect that the whole settlement of Watford Fields was built for the workforce.

Looking downstream.