Roman Road, London

Roman Road is a road in East London, England, in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets and lies on the old romans road in the Roman Empire called the Pye Road running from the capital of the Iceni at Venta Icenorum (near modern Norwich) to Londinium (modern London) and today hosts a market. It lies in five districts: Bow and Old Ford at its eastern end, while the area with the same name Roman Road lies to just west, to the middle is Mile End and Bethnal Green at its western end.HistoryThere is some debate about whether the Romans marched along what is now the Roman Road, which runs more or less parallel to the Roman road which connected London to Colchester. Roman remains were found in an 1845 dig on the current site of Armagh Road, and there have been further Roman finds since, which seems to justify the name. Early maps show a 'Driftway', or footpath, where the Roman Road now runs in an area that was rural up to the middle of the 19th century (old maps show a windmill near the present Ford Close). Old Ford is the main road and a toll road links Mile End to Hackney (Grove Road).The Metropolitan Board of Works, set up in 1855 to provide a sewer system for London, was also responsible for improving roads and this was when the Roman Road, as it was called from the start, was built, on the Driftway, extending Bethnal Green Road and Green Street eastwards. It was paid for by local residents and public and private sources. In the 1870s, there were discussions about extending the Roman Road to Stratford, but this was not to be. In the 1930s, Bethnal Green's Green Street was merged into the Roman Road – and all the shop and house numbers were changed accordingly.