Loughborough Junction, Lambeth
A station and a tangle of railway lines located halfway along Coldharbour Lane where Brixton meets Camberwell, deriving its name from Henry Hastings, first Baron Loughborough
A Jamaican takeaway on Loughborough Road, where a spliff-smoking chef was cooking on a pavement barbecue when this photograph was taken
In 1660 Lord Loughborough acquired the old manor house of Lambeth Wick, which had extensive grounds occupying an area then known as Cold Harbour. The house later became a boys’ school and was demolished in 1854, when the Loughborough Park estate was being laid out. The Loughborough Hotel now occupies its site.
Loughborough Junction station opened in 1863, followed by another station to its west, originally called Loughborough Park, later East Brixton. By the end of the 19th century many of the area’s larger villas were being subdivided into flats. A number of these houses survive but much of the area’s housing stock was lost in a post-war demolition programme around Coldharbour Lane to clear the way for an inner London ring road that was never built. The council flats of the Loughborough estate subsequently filled the breach, notably the eleven-storey blocks around Barrington Road. Loughborough Park public gardens opened in 1972. East Brixton station closed in 1976.
Loughborough primary school, on Minet Road, opened as a ‘fresh start school in 2002, serving the Loughborough estate. Around four-fifths of its pupils come from minority ethnic backgrounds and at least 28 different mother tongues are spoken.
