This is one of the Underground's great unbuilt stations, fully planned but never a foundation laid. It was due to be the terminus of an extended Northern line heading three stopsbeyond Edgware, but although Brockley Hill got some viaduct and Elstree South gained a substation nothing whatsoever was built at Bushey Heath. All works on the extension ceased in September 1939 with the outbreak of WW2, and the Town and Country Planning Act 1947 then put paid to the project. With the new Green Belt protecting the surrounding fields the extension now had no purpose and in 1950 it was cancelled forever. To visit the site of the potential terminus is the ultimate in whatiffery.
The proposedlocation was a remote junction on the Watford Bypass, specifically where the A41 crosses Elstree Road. The roads here cross at an acute angle like a pair of scissors, the pivot being a grassy elliptical roundabout. Pedestrians are very much an afterthought, as you'll know if you've followed section 15 of the London Loop which directs walkers across the swirling throng unaided. Paltry pavements follow one side of each of the approach roads, the A41 pair really only suitable for long-distance masochists. After all the rain we've had I had to time my passage carefully to avoid an almighty kersplash.
The station, a classic CharlesHolden design with the inevitable brick tower, was planned to fill the eastern wedge. Passengers would have poured out of two angled exits towards four adjacent bus stops, with burrowing subways connecting to those on the other side of the road. A large car park would have been provided but also segregated cycle tracks because bike safety was key even in the 1930s. Meanwhile the adjacent sides of the roundabout would be gifted significant shopping parades - two dozen units each - and the opposite wedge would host a pub and a cinema because all this was destined to become the heart of a significant suburban neighbourhood.
Instead the 'station' is a squidgy field grazed by a few horses, more Bushey Marsh than Bushey Heath. The northern row of shops is another field, occasionally used for car boot sales, spanned by a line of pylons. And the would-be cinema lies underneath a motorway embankment because what did eventually get built here was the M1. It swoops across Elstree Road shortly after junction 4, a few hundred metres into Hertfordshire, so you've quite possibly driven through. And it only passes this way because the suburb of Bushey Heath was never built so there were still fields to exploit, and so it is that the Underground's loss was the motorist's gain.
These days nobody lives within half of a mile of the proposed station, horses excepted, and residents on the well-off periphery of Bushey are stuck with their cars. The nearest bus stop is called 'Motorway bridge' and on Sundays is lucky to see a service every two hours. But if you stand by the roundabout and close your eyes you can almost imagine the chicken shops and cafes, the families come to buy their weekly groceries and the estate agents flogging the three-bed semis that surround on all sides. The Green Belt giveth, and the Green Belt taketh away.
Composers Park
On the southern edge of the village of Elstree, ideally placed for Elstree South station had it been built, lies the Composers Estate. It comprises an arc of interwar housing, perhaps council, whose streets are all named after famous composers. It's an eclectic mix. The longest road is Sullivan Way, which I assume is for comic opera composer Sir Arthur Sullivan, off which lead Beethoven Road, Schubert Road, Delius Close, Britten Close and Elgar Close. I see no significant local connections. I'm a little more baffled by Coates Road, and the later additions of Webber Close and Rodgers Close who sound more easy listening than classical... but I digress.
Their local greenspace is therefore called Composers Park and has been brightened by a rainbow clef and a metal stave by the main entrance gates. I still haven't worked out what that tune is supposed to be. The park started out as a hay meadow and ten years got ago a lottery boost with the addition of play equipment, interpretation boards and a pond. Hertsmere council have even produced a leaflet to say how marvellous it is, especially the wildflowers, butterflies and other wildlife.
I was therefore tempted inside this sloping haven for a good look around, only to find that the all-weather path gave up after a few metres and the grass was secretly sodden whichever way I walked. I tried escaping across the five-a-side pitch, then up the hill, then behind the plantation, but all I ended up with were increasingly soggy socks... so I retreated and that just made them wetter still. I'm sure it's lovely in the summer.
Moat Mount Open Space
I just missed a bus in Borehamwood so I thought I'd walk back to Edgware down the A1 instead. Barnet Way is a fearsome dual carriageway, as you'll know if you've walked section 16 of the London Loop and had to divert a mile to cross it. I hadn't got far when I reached a layby which was unexpectedly full of cars, recently-parked, many of their owners busy extracting bags and other housewares from the boot. As I continued the cars became more plentiful, now parked all down the verge and with family groups and couples disgorging in large numbers. I followed them south carrying abundant supplies of food, also blankets, chairs and shisha pipes poking out of carrier bags. Some had even parked on the opposite side of the road and were having to vault the lofty central reservation, or duck under it, to get across. And still they came, essentially to the middle of nowhere for some enormous gathering.
I tried to piece together the clues. It looked like a celebration for a culture based overseas, perhaps in the Middle East. The police were clearly aware because they'd sealed off the nearest bus stop and were chatting to folk who'd parked in a stupid place, but they weren't trying to stop the event. One of the cars had a green, white and red flag flying from its roof. And then hurrah, the owner of a large car parked on the verge had chosen the numberplate PF5 1RAN for their Merc, and finally I knew which diaspora was responsible.
Sizdah Bedar is an Iranian festival held annually on the thirteenth day of the new year. It marks the end of the Nowruz holidays and is always held on April 1st or 2nd because that's a dozen days after the spring equinox. It's also known as Nature Day, the day that Iranians leave their houses to picnic together outdoors, play games, dance, drink Sekanjebin, eat lettuce and throw sprouts in moving water (or just some of the above). I think north London's Iranian community celebrates in a different park each year and this year for some reason they'd picked Moat Mount Open Space - ideal for being off-piste but utterly atrocious for parking.
At the point of maximum kerfuffle I finally spied hordes scattered across the wet clearing by the entrance, and much further into the woods too, staked out beside tents, barbecues, coolboxes, portable feasts and a lot of folding chairs. Some years the weather must be perfect, other years borderline inhospitable, with this particular April 2nd tending towards the latter. The New Year climate must be a lot better in Tehran. But it wasn't stopping thousands of Iranians gathering yesterday for a massive outdoor celebration and maintaining a traditional connection with home, in a Barnet nature reserve accessed off an uninhabited stretch of the A1, on Nature Day.
