On Sun, 7 Jan 2007, Paul Terry wrote:

In message , Tom Anderson
writes

Also, there's a copy of a map from the 1944 Abercrombie London masterplan,
mostly detailing the layout of the green belt, but it shows the locations
of airports. I recognised Heathrow, Northolt (i think) and the one down
near Croydon, but there was also one shown to the east, within the M25,
north of the river (i think - i didn't make an exact note). Any idea what
that might be?

Undoubtedly Fairlop, which had been earmarked as a replacement for Croydon
long before Abercrombie.

Righto. Had never heard of this before. According to this map:

http://www.smartin67.freeserve.co.uk/sketch.jpg

And looking at an aerial photo:

http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=fair...t=h&iwloc=addr

It looks like the airfield was about half the size of Heathrow:

http://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=heat...97504&t=h&om=1

But then i suppose it could have been expanded over the fields to the
east. Seems like quite a practical location for a station, i have to say!

In fact (and to tie-in with another recent thread here) I've long
suspected that the rather extraordinary idea of projecting the Central
Line round the little-used Fairlop loop came about because London
Transport had its eye on potential airport traffic after the war.

Makes sense. Although from a modern point of view, it would have made more
sense to keep the Ilford - Newbury Park connection, and use it to run a
Crossrail branch there!

tom

--
We can only see a short distance ahead, but we can see plenty there that
needs to be done. -- Alan Turing