2009-06-19
London’s High Line
Kottke on Nine Reasons The High Line Sucks:
He missed James Kunstler’s assertion that the whole thing should have remained a railroad.
In the early years of this decade, I always wanted to try and walk along the disused railway line from Dalston towards Broad Street. The old bridges dominate the eastern end of what was the the Shoreditch one-way triangle, and the arches form a line of spaces parallel to the High Street, and further north, on the other side of Kingsland Road. However, I never bothered spending enough time to figure out how to get onto it, and I was worried the various bridges would never be safe.
I’ve definitely lost my chance now; the northernmost three quarters of the track bed are currently in the last year or so of the work required to convert them back into a railway line, this time under the auspices of London Overground.
Of course, the geographical surroundings are very different; the High Line is in Manhattan (albeit one one edge), compared to the fringes of central London for the Dalston line, and the need for public transport along its route is far less pressing. (The Eighth Avenue / A-C-E line runs parallel to the High Line, two blocks further east, whereas the new East London line will be filling a fairly large gap in the railway map of London.)
All in all, I suspect the two cities have probably come to the right planning conclusion for each line. Still, I regret not walking what was, for twenty years, London’s High Line.
