Roads

In each of the above categories, the map shows only those towns and cities for which significant remains of the corresponding activities are still in existence (buildings, museums, historic areas).
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Main roads:

• Roads to old cities:
  • The Great North Road from London to Edinburgh passed through Stamford and York, which partly owed their prosperity to their position as stages on the way.
  • The road from London to Bristol owed its properity to the cloth trade; the ’Old Bath Road’ diverged from it.

• Roads to the new industrial towns: Birmingham, as a newly developing town, was badly served by the road system inherited from the past, the Roman road from London to Chester bypassed it, and the most usual road was through Oxford.There was a road from Birmingham to Bristol, used to transport coal.

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A late advertisement for the Bristol and Bath to London stagecoach (1837)

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Administration:

• The main roads were maintained through the ’turnpike’ system - companies obtaining an act of Parliament to run the roads and charge at ’turnpikes’. In some cases, charges from the turnpikes contributed to the improvement of cities: the debt incurred for some new developments in Bath was serviced by tolls from the neighbouring roads.

• The small roads were maintained by parishes.