New Cross

New Cross was named after a coaching inn, and with two stations and three trunk roads all heading somewhere else, it has stayed loyal to the idea of leaving. Goldsmiths keeps producing bands that get famous enough to move out. The Victorians called the railway junction the New Cross Tangle, and the A2 at rush hour suggests nobody ever got round to untangling it. Estate agents have a word for the nicest streets here, and the word is Brockley.