SecretLeeds - History, culture and architecture in Leeds

I'm sure there is a very prosaic explanation, but I have started noticing that old curbstones all round Hyde Park seem to be coded, either 'BL', 'F' or with an arrow...

I've noticed this a lot but I have no idea what they mean.

Is it BL or B.L? Maps marking out road junctions use the abbreviation BL for a bollard. Doesn't sound likely to me but it would be interesting to see if there is anything in common with the marked locations.

Well, these are on the old stone kerbstones everywhere. The most common seems to be E L with arrows pointing to either side. As well as F there is also P O and small crosses. I'm sure it must be to do with the original laying out of the roads. I wonder if some of them refer to services under th pavement. F=Fire?? PO=Post Office?Even saw a workmans name chiselled into a stone.

That's what I was thinking... telephone couplings & the like. But that 'BL' or '8L' or 'EL', whatever it is, must appear literally thousands of times across the city. It can't have been a quick job to have done all that carving! Sometimes the letters cross the join between stones, which would suggest that they were carved in situ, not wherever the stones themselves were cut & dressed.

munki wrote: That's what I was thinking... telephone couplings & the like. But that 'BL' or '8L' or 'EL', whatever it is, must appear literally thousands of times across the city. It can't have been a quick job to have done all that carving! Sometimes the letters cross the join between stones, which would suggest that they were carved in situ, not wherever the stones themselves were cut & dressed. Usually there's stone markers indicating couplings. I noticed one of those myself in Beeston today, it isn't indicating anything to do with Drains or sewerage is it?

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Just noticed there are three of these <BL> kerb-stones in the street outside my work. Did anyone ever find out what they're for?

Probably a self critique of the idiot that put certain stones in the wrong order....Boll***sJust a thought ..    

I always thought that they were indicators to the fire brigade where there was a fire hydrant. I always thought that they'd been put there in the war.