Squeezing Through

 Fleetville's Infant School and Nursery has always been problematically sited.  For a start, it wasn't intended to be located where it is.  If the developer had got his way there would have been homes in both Woodstock Road South and in Royal Way.  If two different developers had agreed to work together Royal Road would have joined with Burnham Road.  If the County Council had thought more carefully – well, the parents of Fleetville, formed into an association as early as 1906, could have pressed for a school site in a better location.  If.  

The build-out to provide t he narrowest distance for pedestrians to cross and ensure
pedestrians are not hidden between parked vehicles.  The truck was following the signed 
instruction to give way to oncoming traffic – not easy as the road ahead begins with
a blind bend and  hill.

This road is also part of the Green Ring around St Albans.  This makes it rather challenging for
cyclists to use in both directions.  Nevertheless, the Green Ring is sign-posted.

The function of the pavement post may be well-intentioned, but of limited value
if vehicles are in a position to move it from its intended position.

Access to the school has always been problematic.  Children have always accessed the school grounds from both the front or the back, that is, Royal Road and Woodstock Road South. Parking in both roads was always limited  and large vehicles are a regular requirement – waste lorries, lack of turning facilities in  Royal Road, and at one time in Woodstock Road double-deck buses were routed its full length, although only towards Hatfield Road from Brampton Road.  At the beginning and end of the school day the level of pedestrian (and buggy) traffic mushrooms.

As the greenery on the school site is vulnerable to growing across the footpath both at
low height and outwards as tree branches, the footpath is less useful, especially in wet and
wintery conditions.

It is not just a placement post when becomes damaged, but the very fences designed
to protect children when leaving the school and from running into the road.

So, what do we make of the recent incident of a large truck trying to make its way from Hatfield Road northwards past the school.  The St Albans' Times online paper recently published photos of young children and parents squeezing through a partly blocked footpath to reach the school gate.

The truck, being where it was, had its nearside wheels on the pavement,  as shown on a photograph taken by a pedestrian.  It was there to allow a vehicle though the pedestrian crossing build-out in the opposite direction.  A protective post on the footpath was sufficiently distant from the build-out to accommodate the truck, but it is not clear how it manoeuvred there.  The accompanying photographs above, however, and taken at times between 2014 and 2024.are sufficient to show the scene on an otherwise cleared road.  We can make our own mind up!

Photographs above courtesy GOOGLE STREETVIEW

Original article ST ALBANS TIMES.co.uk 26 September 2026

DROPPING IN

 Wherever we live there will locations not too far away where risks exist in the course of our daily lives.  Often risks we would not normally be aware of – until something happens to make us suddenly more alert.  A vehicle leaving the road at speed and making a dent in your front living room; a train leaving the tracks and ending up in your back garden at the foot of an embankment; an aeroplane losing a landing wheel or depositing a block of its ice in a nearby park.

St Albans' own east end has received its own share of transport incidents through time, and because it is close to airfields, among them Harpsfield airfield (known as de Havilland) and Handley Page's former airfield, known at the beginning of aero history as St Julian's airfield, we received our fair share of visits from the sky.

When air incidents were considered "novel" photographs could almost be guaranteed for publication in the Herts Advertiser.  Even a special edition had been known on such an occasion. Here is a selection of what might be called rough landings from the 1930s, in no particular chronological sequence.

Original headline:  Aeroplane Crash

The wreckage of a two-seater aeroplane which crashed at Hammonds Wood, near Sandridge.  The pilot was only slightly injured.

Original headline: Monoplane Crash at Hatfield

An instructional plane which crashed in a field adjoining the Hatfield and St Albans Road near Hatfield.  The pilot, Flying Officer, W B Wilson, was injured.  His passenger, Mr J R Denny, escaped injury.

Original headline: 'Plane wrecked at Hatfield (1935)

Crashed into a tree when landing. Two airmen were slightly injured when their plane crashed into a field adjoining Hatfield Aerodrome.  The machine, a dual control Avro Cadet used for Flying Officers' training,  is owned by the Civil Training Company of Hamble Hants. It collided with a tree on the Harpsfield Hall Estate.

Original headline: None (1938)

Three men lost their lives when two aeroplanes collided in mid-air and burst into flames at Smallford.  This picture was reprinted from a Special Edition of the Herts Advertiser published last Friday.

 

Original headline: Aeroplane at Hatfield (1932)

The wreckage of an aeroplane which crashed at Hatfield on Sunday.  The pilot, Mr F W Marshall of the Royal Air Force Reserve, escaped serious injury.

Original headline: Bombing 'Plane Crash (1931)

Royal Air Force bombing plane which crashed while landing at the Handley Page aerodrome, Colney Street near StAlbans on Tuesday.  The pilot and his passenger escaped injury.

Original headline: Fatal Aeroplane Crash near Hatfield (1937)

Mr R J Waight, chief test pilot of the de Havilland Aircraft Co Ltd in the TK4 machine which crashed into a field near the Aerodrome on Friday.  Mr Waight was fatally injured.

 Original headline: Plane Crash at Sandridge (1935)

The wreckage of an instructional aeroplane from the de Havilland School of Flying, Hatfield, which crashed at Sandridge, on Friday.  The pilot, Mr L C Cheetham of Darby, escaped injury.

All of the above photographs are printed courtesy the Herts Advertiser.

RESCUE MISSION 9

 Smallford Speedway

Our series of locations with a shortage of publicly available photographs with buildings and sites in their early days is quite extensive; in many cases we have already passed the point of no return.  Buildings can change their functions of course, but what if the site contained no permanent building in the first place?  Yes, it might offer the opportunity to explore some archaeology courtesy of the current land owner, but that is very different from a photograph.

East of Notcutt's Garden Centre at Smallford was a site with an entrance directly from the Hatfield Road about which almost no-one has any memory.  There is a public footpath leading from the road northwards past the Radio Estate and you could walk the path and fail to point to a clue that large numbers of people had once gathered there.

Footpath from Hatfield Road northwards towards the former Radio Station, now the Radio Estate.

But in the decade leading up to 1939 you might have occasionally spotted a panelled advertisement in the Herts Advertiser similar to the one below.  This was a period in which motor-cycle speedway races were popular, and no doubt large numbers of St Albans' residents walked along the main road to enjoy an afternoon excitedly watching motorcyclists careering around an oval track in pursuit of a trophy or other prize.

COURTESY THE HERTS ADVERTISER

It was quite "a thing" pre-war and many towns had their own clubs in the same way most towns of any size were proud to own their own local football clubs.

Modern aerial photographs still indicate the location, and the size and shape of the field used for speedway at Smallford, as shown in the photograph below, courtesy Google Earth.   Next to the boundary of the garden centre is the above mentioned footpath; to the right of which is a field within a field and beyond that is the former homestead of Popefield Farm.  The vegetation growing in the field within is scrubby, but indicates the location of  the speedway track.

Notcutt's Garden Centre is in the bottom left corner, east of which is a footpath.  Hatfield Road
passes across the bottom of the photo towards Popefield Farm.  In between is the
scrubby area which used to be the Smallford Speedway track.
COURTESY GOOGLE EARTH

The infrastructure was known to have been minimal, and on the eastern side was a raised platform, perhaps covered.  Not much else.

St Albans may have punched above its weight for the time, but its closure undoubtedly came about rather suddenly because of the onset of the Second World War, rather than a loss of interest among spectators or competitors.  It seems the site has remained unused ever since, although the home ground for the Eastbourne club is still operational at Arlington just outside the town, is floodlit, and until recently still ran meetings for stock-car racing.  It had opened for speedway in the same year, 1929, as Smallford.

Still-open Arlington Stadium near Hailsham/Eastbourne.
COURTESY ARLINGTON STADIUM

Of all the unusual or rare images surviving in our Rescue Mission series, the most difficult to find has been this location; in fact not a single example has yet to be discovered!

Unless, of course a blog reader knows otherwise!

Near Cell Barnes Lane was an example of a less formal vehicular sport, cycle speedway.  Fortunately we do have examples of this short-lived entertainment, courtesy of Bill Gadsby who provided photographs, and evidence of programmes which were available.

Post-war cycle speedway at Cell Barnes before modern development.
COURTESY BILL GADSBY

COVER PICTURES 9

Private A Hopkins and family

Who is this uniformed man who stands proudly on the front cover of St Albans' Own East End Volume 1?  We might have considered Mr Hopkins to be just another resident of Fleetville in the early years of the twentieth century.  He might have agreed.  But the view of Fleetville residents was elevated after the First World War.

He was one of many soldiers whose photos appeared in the Herts Advertiser in those years, and also occupied the pages of several chapters of St Albans' Own East End.  They may have gained honours for bravery, or, more likely commemorated for giving their lives in the service of their country.

Pte A T Hopkins, KIA 1917
COURTESY DAVID PAYNE COLLECTION

If we walk, or drive, along Hatfield Road we can remember where Alfred and his family had lived, exactly. A house on the corner of Hatfield Road and Cavendish Road, where early residents of the growing district had engaged Alfred to carry out internal improvements to their homes; he and one of his brothers ran a decorating business.

Home of the Hopkins family, 1 Horndean Villas, Hatfield Road,
as seen in the present day.

Walking along Alma road where now is a new housing development, was a printing works called Dangerfield's, later Evershed's.  This is where Alfred's father worked.  Alfred's brothers, Robert and James together fought and were injured.  However, Alfred lost his life.

His Company diary for 20th September 1917 in the Passchendale-Ypres Offensive, recorded that fire was opened and lifted to the various barrage lines.  During the programme on that day casualties included five killed (A T Hopkins among this number) and three wounded from shellfire.

According to a descendant of Alfred, David Payne, Alfred has no known grave but his name is among those commemorated on the wall at Tyne Cot Cemetery.

Helen and her children Enda, Alfred jar and Vera.
COURTESY DAVID PAYNE COLLECTION

Among those not so far mentioned in this account was Helen, Alfred's widow and their three young children, who we might imagine continued their Fleetville lives struggling emotionally and finding great difficulty financially.

However, as probably occurred in many communities, a small group of men living nearby in Clarence, Blandford, Glenferrie and Brampton roads raised a fund for the benefit of Helen and her children to spare them from the worst hardships of the following years.