Colchester Civic Society’s project to renovate our cast iron lampposts is now in it’s third year. In the previous two years more than forty of Colchester’s historic cast iron lampposts, most of which were made in local foundries during the early years of the twentieth century, have been stripped and repainted.
This year teams in Studd Lane, Beverley Road, Queens Road and Victoria Road have already stripped and repainted their cast iron lampposts using paint and equipment supplied by Colchester Civic Society (with Essex Highways providing the black top coat and grey undercoat)
First off the block this year was Studd Lane where the single lamppost in this unmade Road in Mile End was completed in early May. Close behind was the team in Victoria Road, who completed their work in time for the Queen’s Jubilee. Queens Road completed their work shortly after and have now passed on their paint and equipment to a team in The Avenue, who have begun work there. Beverley Road are near to completing their cast iron lampposts and are already looking to possibly expanding into surrounding Streets. We would love to see volunteers come forward from Cambridge Road and Creffield Road.
We are awaiting news from Gladstone Road and Salisbury Avenue, who have also been supplied with paint and equipment and another team is standing by in Hamilton Road, where we are awaiting the verdict from Essex Highways on whether their cast iron lampposts will be converted to LED and be assured of survival.
There are many many more of these historic cast iron lampposts in need of renovation in the late Victorian and Edwardian streets of Colchester and Colchester Civic Society would love to hear from you if you are interested in getting involved. (just email info@colchestercivicsociety.co.uk)
It may seem a daunting prospect, especially if you do not already know others who are interested. But as this account from Jonathan McLeod in Victoria Road tells us it can quickly take off.
“Initially I put a message on our Victoria road WhatsApp group asking if anyone wanted to join me renovating the lampposts along the road. I had eight people message me saying they were interested and so I set up a special WhatsApp group for our team.
I then allocated the lamp posts to individuals/Couples. I wrote down guidelines on how the lampposts should be painted.
I then put a plastic storage trunk outside the front of our house with a combination lock attached and put all the paints and brushes etc in the trunk.
I asked everyone to come round and showed them how to use things. From then on they just helped themselves whenever they needed anything. We all kept each other informed of our progress via the WhatsApp group. It worked very well and meant that people just fitted in the work as and when they could. “
Below are photos from the Beverley Road team at work .
