A103
A103 | ||||
Location Map ( geo) | ||||
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From: | Highbury (TQ309854) | |||
To: | Hornsey (TQ307893) | |||
Distance: | 2.9 miles (4.7 km) | |||
Meets: | A1, A503, B540, A1201, A504 | |||
Primary Destinations | ||||
Highway Authorities | ||||
Traditional Counties | ||||
Route outline (key) | ||||
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Route
For such a low-numbered road the A103 is surprisingly unimportant, though it does make a much quicker route from Wood Green to the A1 and the centre of London than going via Manor House and Finsbury Park like everyone else.
Highbury - Hornsey
The A103 starts at traffic lights on the A1 by Holloway Road tube station as Hornsey Road. It head northeastwards and almost immediately comes to a roundabout with some unclassified roads by the Arsenal stadium and veers left, under a long railway bridge over which runs the main line to King's Cross and which is always plastered with fly-posters, and over two separate sets of traffic lights with the A503, which is in a one-way system at this point. Past those and up the hill, one sees Hornsey Baths and a cop shop on your right (no speeding - not that it's possible anyway) before more traffic lights at the junction of Tollington Park (where Frederick Seddon the Edwardian poisoner lived) and Hanley Road. All a very grubby area, this. We are running parallel to the A1 over to our left.
The hill steepens to the point where buses are a severe pain to get stuck behind until it finally flattens out at the top of Hornsey Rise at the junction with the B540 Hornsey Lane, well worth a detour for the road fan as this is the road which goes across the celebrated Archway.
The A103 continues, over the course of the former Seven Sisters to Ally Pally rail line (one of the few London railways no longer extant, though periodic calls for its reinstatement are made as Crouch End and Muswell Hill are dreadful to get to on public transport without it) and down Crouch End Hill to a set of lights, a brief multiplex with the A1201 and then more lights at the clock tower in Crouch End where the A1201 leaves again.
The A103 continues along Tottenham Lane, has a small roundabout with the unclassified Ferme Park Road (note the demolished building here; a bus failed to make it round the roundabout a little while ago and hit a shop at full tilt) and past a second police station, which is no doubt the cause for the pub opposite being named the Pig and Whistle (and yes, the sign does have a pink piggy wiggy in blue uniform). Just past here the road splits into a one-way system, with Church Lane running north to a T-junction on the A504 Hornsey High Street at lights, while Tottenham Lane is one way southbound from the junction of Hornsey High Street and Turnpike Lane past Hornsey station to where Church Lane diverges. And that's the end of the story for the A103.