South Cross Route

South Cross Route (SCR) was the designation for the southern section of Ringway 1, the innermost circuit of the London Ringways network, a complex and comprehensive plan for a network of high speed roads circling and radiating out from central London designed to manage and control the flow of traffic within the capital.

The SCR would have started in Battersea at the south-west corner of Ringway 1 where it would have had a junction with the West Cross Route coming south-east across the River Thames from Earl's Court.

Just as the road itself attracted objections, the redevelopment of the town centre met with considerable local opposition and virtually none of the proposals were implemented.

It was intended to locate a junction here to connect the SCR to a motorway running south-east along the railway line to Herne Hill and then to South Norwood and a probable terminal on Ringway 3 at or near Addington.

[1] Crossing the southbound railway line from Blackfriars station, the SCR would have continued east, requiring further demolitions on the south side of the Loughborough Junction triangle to reach Ruskin Park.

For its route through Peckham the SCR would have claimed Blenheim Grove on the south side of the station and more industrial land to its east before following the railway to Nunhead station on an alignment where the wide area of railway land to the south of the tracks would have provided a route requiring only limited demolition, mainly to the north side of Kimberley Avenue.

At this junction, the south-east corner of the London Motorway Box traffic would have been directed on to the A2 with slip roads providing connections to and from the A20 and the East Cross Route.

Here the Balham Loop would have met the "South Cross Route to Parkway D Radial" motorway and traffic would have had the option of turning north-east towards Brixton or south-east to West Norwood.

The "South Cross Route to Parkway D Radial" motorway was due to start on the SCR at Brixton and run south-east out of London to Ringway 3.

From the SCR the radial motorway would have first followed the railway line south-east past Herne Hill and Brockwell Park to Tulse Hill, West Norwood and Crystal Palace station where it would have turned and headed south along the line towards South Norwood Country Park, which in the 1960s was a sewage works.