Walking down Parker Street a few weeks ago, on my way to find The Herds* I saw three circular man hole covers at the junction with Newton Street and went to get a closer look to see if any fragments of wood were in them. Nope. But, unusually, they all have their identification codes still visible.
More recently, whilst leading my Art Deco Camden walking tour last Saturday, I glanced down at the tarmac in Greenland Street, just before its junction with Camden High Street, and noticed a square cover plate containing remnants of wood block road surface, set within the parking bay. I returned after the walk to take some photos:
I'm unsure what kind of utilities were accessible beneath here but eighteen of the 25 small square sections still contain wood. Wow! How had I missed this before? Probably because I was only looking for circular covers as per the ones in Chalk Farm Road. You'll find a list of my ever-expanding collection of woodblock sightings in the A-Z here.
There may well be other similar grid-format examples nearby, but on Saturday it was too hot to be out in full sunshine in the middle of the day so I will have a look another day.
Round the corner in Greenland Place there is another interesting 'ghostsign' manhole cover – Mercury Communications – remember them?!
*did you see The Herds? Wow! Images and videos can be found on my Instagram @janeslondon / @janeslondonwalks
