John Rowland wrote:
From: Benjamin Lukoff )
Subject: High Street Kensington Station
Date: 2000/01/29


If the actual name of the street is KENSINGTON HIGH STREET,
why is the station called HIGH STREET KENSINGTON?


Only 54 months late, but I think I've figured it out.

The London County Council decided at some point (1930s I think) that it was
going to ensure there were no duplicate road names in its area, and took to
renaming vast tracts of the county of London. I suspect that prior to this
date, Kensington High St, Clapham High St, Stepney High St etc, and the
biggest mouthful of them all St Johns Wood High St, had all been called
"High St". Obviously "High St" would have been a crap name for a station.
The station could just as well have been called ""Kensington High St" but
they happened to pick "High St Kensington" instead. When the streets were
renamed, all of the High Streets in London had the district name prefixed,
creating the present anomaly. I suppose this was also when the mouthful
"Stoke Newington Church Street" was created.

Interesting, I've wondered that too... the problem is that many people -
especially visitors or newcomers - use Tube stations as landmarks, so
just as when someone refers to "Tottenham Court Road" they invariably
mean St Giles Circus, most students at Imperial refer to Kensington High
St as High St Ken. It seems to roll off the tongue a bit better too.

--
Dave Arquati
Imperial College, SW7
www.alwaystouchout.com - Transport projects in London