In 1660 Lord Loughborough acquired the old manor house of Lambeth Wick, which had extensive grounds occupying an area then known as Cold Harbour.

The council flats of the Loughborough estate subsequently filled the breach, notably the eleven-storey blocks around Barrington Road.

In this aspect, Loughborough Junction is similar to Pimlico in Westminster with a grid of Victorian houses neighbouring council estate blocks of Lupus Street.

This provides Loughborough Junction with a direct link southbound to Herne Hill, Streatham, Tooting, Wimbledon, Mitcham, and Sutton, amongst other destinations in South London.

Several bus routes pass via Loughborough Junction (35, 45, 345, P4) providing convenient connections between Central London and South East.

The area itself deteriorated over the years, due partly to planning blight related to transport schemes that were never realised and to the neglect of its housing stock by both private and council landlords.

The Warrior was for a short time used for occasional pop-up cultural events—particularly the "7 Bridges" project, a locally-based initiative to improve the area—but has now been redeveloped as a Tesco Metro supermarket.

Loughborough Junction is home to Whirled Arts, which runs a cinema in the railway arches on Hardess Street, showing mainly arthouse and foreign-language films, and also hosting literary and musical events.

British Transport Police later warned of the "massive risk" graffiti artists make by trespassing on train tracks.

A former Transport for London (TfL) board member, Brian Cooke, was criticised by social media users after he tweeted that the three men who died were "common scum who cost the railway millions and keep fares high".