Bricklayers Arms is the road intersection of the A2 and the London Inner Ring Road where Bermondsey meets Walworth and Elephant & Castle in south London. It is the junction of

Tower Bridge Road The London Inner Ring Road, or Ring Road as signposted, is a route with an average diameter of formed from a number of major roads that encircle Central London. The ring road forms the boundary of the London congestion charge zone, although t ...

, Old Kent Road,

New Kent Road New Kent Road is a road in the London Borough of Southwark. The road was created in 1751 when the Turnpike Trust upgraded a local footpath. This was done as part of the general road improvements associated with the creation of Westminster Br ...

and

Great Dover Street Great Dover Street is a road in Southwark, south London, England. At the northwest end it joins Marshalsea Road and Borough High Street and there is a junction with Long Lane; Borough Underground station is at this location. At the southeast ...

. It comprises a four-way green roundabout plus one-way flyover and one-way bypass lane. The latter help traffic using any of the six road bridges west of

London Bridge Several bridges named London Bridge have spanned the River Thames between the City of London and Southwark, in central London. The current crossing, which opened to traffic in 1973, is a box girder bridge built from concrete and steel. It r ...

to access the arterial road to and from the south-east quadrant of the orbital motorway, Old Kent Road. Specifically, eastbound traffic from New Kent Road to Old Kent Road can use the flyover; the reverse flow can use the ground-level bypass lane. The junction is named after a

coaching inn The coaching inn (also coaching house or staging inn) was a vital part of Europe's inland transport infrastructure until the development of the railway, providing a resting point ( layover) for people and horses. The inn served the needs of tra ...

that stood here, in turn related to the prowess of Kent in brickmaking. It is centred 500 metres north-west of Mandela Way which was at the heart of the main goods and locomotive sheds named the Bricklayers Arm depots and similar.

Coaching inn and brick carts

A succession of inns, the original name which may have been the documented Bricklayers Arms, served this junction for more than six hundred years. Excavations during the rebuilding of the inn in the 1890s came across very old foundations and a hidden hoard of ancient coins. After the mid-18th century building of Westminster Bridge (and associated

) this was where the many mid- and east-Kent, such as

Dover Dover () is a town and major ferry port in Kent, South East England. It faces France across the Strait of Dover, the narrowest part of the English Channel at from Cap Gris Nez in France. It lies south-east of Canterbury and east of Maidstone ...

, Maidstone and Canterbury coaches using the Old Kent Road to or from the City of London set down or picked up passengers travelling to or from the West End. The inn's landlord was always the City of London Corporation. Its sign was the coat of arms of the

Worshipful Company of Tylers and Bricklayers The Worshipful Company of Tylers and Bricklayers is one of the livery companies of the City of London. The organisation of Tylers (roof and floor tile layers) and Bricklayers existed in 1416; it was incorporated by a royal charter in 1568. Origi ...

. The road – and nearby yards – were busy with the supply of bricks to London. Major brickearth deposits, regionally, are in Kent, particularly on the North Downs dip slope and on the Hoo peninsula, sections of the

Medway Medway is a unitary authority district and conurbation in Kent, South East England. It had a population of 278,016 in 2019. The unitary authority was formed in 1998 when Rochester-upon-Medway amalgamated with the Borough of Gillingham to for ...

and Stour valleys. Its mineral content is critical to its applicability in

brickmaking A brick is a type of block used to build walls, pavements and other elements in masonry construction. Properly, the term ''brick'' denotes a block composed of dried clay, but is now also used informally to denote other chemically cured cons ...

and requires precise proportions of chalk, clay, and iron.Loessic Brickearth Map
at Physical Properties and Behaviour of UK Rocks and Soils. British Geological Survey, National Environmental Research Council. Accessed April 2012

Roundabout with flyover

Approval of plans for construction of the roundabout and flyover to replace the junction of, and some buildings at, the Old Kent Road ( A2), New Kent Road ( A201) and Tower Bridge Road ( A100) was given by the London County Council in December 1962 with an initial budget cost of £3,510,000 (). Works were scheduled for 1967. Such construction involved demolition of buildings in all three roads and surrounds as part of a larger regeneration programme. The north end of the Old Kent Road has since the 1750s been bifurcated into Great Dover Street and Tabard Street. These briefly re-combine north of this junction and have taken the greater street's name since the roundabout was built. In the 1970s a plan of

Greater London Council The Greater London Council (GLC) was the top-tier local government administrative body for Greater London from 1965 to 1986. It replaced the earlier London County Council (LCC) which had covered a much smaller area. The GLC was dissolved in 198 ...

envisaged a road to link the roundabout and the north approach to the Blackwall Tunnel, crossing the Thames in two tunnels (one adjacent to

Tower Bridge Tower Bridge is a Listed building#Grade I, Grade I listed combined Bascule bridge, bascule and Suspended-deck suspension bridge, suspension bridge in London, built between 1886 and 1894, designed by Horace Jones (architect), Horace Jones and e ...

) and providing a link to

London Docklands London Docklands is the riverfront and former docks in London. It is located in inner east and southeast London, in the boroughs of London Borough of Southwark, Southwark, London Borough of Tower Hamlets, Tower Hamlets, London Borough of ...

Filling-in of subways

The work done made pedestrian underpasses from adjacent roads into the roundabout heart, as London Underground safeguarded a possible extension route of the

Bakerloo The Bakerloo line () is a London Underground line that goes from in suburban north-west London to in south London, via the West End of London, West End. Printed in brown on the Tube map, it serves 25 stations, 15 of which are underground, ove ...

line from its terminus at Elephant & Castle tube station. This could run along and under the main road under the route of tracks of the demolished station and branch, to join surface services at South Bermondsey station. The roundabout could host a station, akin to Old Street station. Neither remains in the budgeted Bakerloo line extension to Lewisham. The circuitous subways became ugly. In 2013 these were filled in and levelled, becoming wider pavements.

Crossings

Since 2009, pelican crossings exist across New Kent and Old Kent Roads, as pedestrians preferring to cross

at-grade At-grade may refer to: * At-grade intersection, a crossing between roads on the same level * Road junction *Level crossing, where a road or path crosses a railway on the same level * Diamond crossing, where two railway tracks cross * At-grade railwa ...

were causing accidents.

Citations

Sources

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External links

{{commonscat, Bricklayers Arms Streets in the London Borough of Southwark Elevated overpasses in London Road junctions in London