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Why is Laurel Avenue a dual carriageway?


Charles Bannerman

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As it happens I met the Inverness Oracle which is Sheila MacKay in Morrisons today and put the question to her. Sheila's made the point that Laurel Avenue was the first of the post war Dalneigh housing to be built and hence comprised a boundary between the pre war Columba Road and Dochfour Drive and all the "Saints and Trees" (St Valery Ave, Limetree Ave) which were to follow very quickly. She believes that the town planners of the time quite simply expected an increased volume of traffic with increasing car ownership and the extra housing on its far side so decided to make Laurel Avenue a dual cariageway for that reason. She is not aware of any plan to link the A9 north and the A82 but couldn't rule it out.

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She believes that the town planners of the time quite simply expected an increased volume of traffic with increasing car ownership and the extra housing on its far side so decided to make Laurel Avenue a dual cariageway for that reason. She is not aware of any plan to link the A9 north and the A82 but couldn't rule it out.

The town planners must have had a bit of vision back then, more than the planners and officials we have now!

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Here is a good one of Old Dalneigh.

That's an absolutely brilliant photo - and quite an old one as well given the absence even of building works for the High School which was opened in 1936. Dochfour Drive seems to have been started as a road but nothing is built on it down to the end of Rangemore road at least while Bruce Gardens is complete up to just above the scrubland which eventually became the site for the Electric Flats. Dalneigh Crescent and the beginnings of Dalneigh Road are there, and I first wondered if the white houses at the top left might be Lilac Grove? However the shape looks wrong so I am now wondering if they may be Dunain Road or one of its parallels?

Certainly it would seem that "Old" Dalneigh is just beginning whereas "New" Dalneigh - which is a post-war creation - is some years off yet.

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The white houses top left are the top Half of Lochalsh Road with the two large houses to the south are Fairfield Road, I think one of them was a former Manse or Rectory.  To the east of that is the old stone houses at the north end of Dochfour Drive and Rangemore Road.  Can you imagine how many houses would have been built in Dalneigh if Macrae or Tulloch the builders had the land now!

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And across town

I believe this is the area between Drummond Road (on the left) and Culduthel Road (on the right), looking from the South (ie in the general direction of the town).

Towards the top of the photo you can see where Culduthel Rd bends about 45 degrees to the left near the top of Hilton Avenue and then joins Drummond Rd at the crossroads after Drummond Road goes down the dip.

The two linking thoroughfares will possibly be Burn and Lodge Roads.

This is clearly a fairly old photo as well since there are several current features, such as much of the left side of Culduthel Road, which are not there yet.

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And across town

I believe this is the area between Drummond Road (on the left) and Culduthel Road (on the right), looking from the South (ie in the general direction of the town).

Towards the top of the photo you can see where Culduthel Rd bends about 45 degrees to the left near the top of Hilton Avenue and then joins Drummond Rd at the crossroads after Drummond Road goes down the dip.

The two linking thoroughfares will possibly be Burn and Lodge Roads.

This is clearly a fairly old photo as well since there are several current features, such as much of the left side of Culduthel Road, which are not there yet.

 

 

I think you have it spot on CB, but what is the large structure to the left of Drummond Rd as we look at the picture, roughly between Burn Rd and Lodge Rd?  Is it a farm? Or a factory?  I thought I knew that area well but can remember nothing of that size there. 

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This was long before the home was built on the south side of Burn Road which was demolished a few years ago and now has new built houses on the site.  On the north side of the road is the old Delnies farm house which was a piggery, the house is now split into two properties which is on Delnies road and on the west side of the old house is now Delnies Park.  The large building may have been a sawmill but I am not sure.  The large open space to the top left of the picture is now Glenburn Drive.  One of the large stone houses to the front of the open space on Drummond Road now has a flagpole in the front garden with a saltire flying :scotland:

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I just wish photo #63 was of a larger scale! Even when you enlarge it, there are a lot of details you can't quite see clearly.

For a short time, I debated over whether the road on the left was the A9 from the bottom of Drumossie Brae or whether it was Leys or Essich and decided that it was the A9.

That being the case, you can then make out a lot of features - and also the absence of others which makes this also quite an old photo.

For instance the old brick Raigmore Hospital (where some of us would have been born) is not there so that makes it pre-War. Also, if you look very closely at the old Royal Academy field, just right of and above centre, the pavilion, which dates from the mid 1930s, is not there either.

Left of, and above centre you can see Kingsmills Park with, at that time, little more than a shed (no need to comment IHE!). Round about it are the beginnings of MacEwen Drive, as in the earlier photo, which again perhaps suggests early/mid 1930s.

Far right, half way up, you can see the Cameron Barracks and above centre is the prominent feature of the old "gasometer" tower which was just behind the far end of Academy Street.

The line of trees across the centre is, I think, Old Perth Road.

I think some of these photos may be from a set taken at the same time, perhaps on the same flight. Interestingly the dates I am guessing from the presence and absence of landmarks (early/mid 1930s) also happen to correspond with the setting up of air services in the Highlands by Captain Edward Fresson whose statue can be seen in the terminal building at Inverness Airport. Perhaps there is a connection.

Photo #64 is also from the same era but, unlike #56, does not yet have Maxwell Drive or Lindsay Avenue on it, but does have Park Road and Smith Avenue so #64 is obviously a bit older than #56.

Behind Smith Avenue in #64 is an area called Victoria Park which was a public park whose uses had included shinty matches. The circular structure is the surround for the bandstand which can just be seen in its centre.

The Dalneigh Crescent houses look similarly developed to the earlier photo but there seem to be more houses on the upper reaches of Bruce Gardens in #56.  In #64, the aeroplane wing is preventing us from seeing the area where the High School (opened 1936) now is, but since the IHS is not in #56, it won't be in #64 either. Victoria Park has also disappeared by the time of #56.

Is there maybe a couple of years between #56 and #64, given the difference in development?

 

Edited by Charles Bannerman
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You have bet me to it Charles! They are good old photos again, #63 the gasometer is stands out like a sore thumb, on #64 the Cathedral stands out more than anything. Good photos again IHE!

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I think #67 must be somewhat later into the 1930s than some of the others since the Friars Street swimming pool, opened I think in 1936, can be seen. The smoke from the power station (?) is obscuring where I might therefore be tempted to look for the High School but I am wondering if, on the extreme left, you can see the Temporary Bridge under construction?

That was built at the outbreak of WW2 to relieve pressure on the old suspension bridge. That had been due for replacement but the plan was stymied by the outbreak of the war during which it managed perfectly well to carry tanks etc. It wasn't replaced until the current Ness Bridge appeared in the early 60s, whereupon the Temporary Bridge was dismantled.

 

EDIT - on second thoughts, I'm not really able to see the very distinctive suspension bridge far left either, amid that evidence of construction, so I am wondering if this photo is rather later than I first though and may have been taken at the time of the construction of the current bridge (which we called "the New Bridge for years!) around 1959 - 61.  During construction the Temporary Bridge carried all the traffic.

In that event, what the smoke is coming from is unlikely still to be a power station if it ever was. I'm a bit vague on that building because the name Lord Roberts' Workshops also comes to mind. (Lord Roberts was a Victorian army commander so I am assuming that this was some kind of establishment for ex military personnel.)

Edited by Charles Bannerman
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That's the Black Brdige in the foreground isn't it?

 

If so, then right opposite the big truck parked on Shore Street on the left there, is exactly where my father had his tire shop. Northern Tire Service.

I wonder if there is anyone on here who remembers that business?

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Last one fer now

If you are right about the swimming pool Charles that will make it between 1936 & 1947 when the power station closed.  You can see part of the old railway bridge that was washed away in 1989 and that is the Black Bridge Scarlet, it has always been grey since I moved into Inverness!  Along Portland Place to the left of the Black Bridge was the old Cameron Club.  To the left of the picture is the Free Church on Chapel St and the Pentecostal Church which was known as The Model at that time (I think it was a Poorhouse) both churches have no spires but missing in the space behind that is the Friars Lane Telephone Exchange which building started in 1958 and it opened in 1961.  And no McMurry and Archibald on Chapel Street!

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