Video Guide for Royal Avenue - Belfast

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Rare footage of Royal Avenue, Belfast shown alongside its modern day equivalent. Sagar Mitchell and James Kenyon shot a film in May 1901 from a tramcar which shows people milling around the street and busy with ‘traffic’. It follows along Royal Avenue – which was also know as Hercules Street and Herison’s Lean – and then onto Castle Place.

Travel Video Tags for Royal Avenue:

John Street , Hercules Street , Hercules Langford Rowley , Herison’s Lean , Castle Place , tramcar ,

Some of our other Video Guides for Belfast

• Days Hotel Belfast
• Crumlin Road Courthouse
• BIFHE Whiterock
• The Water Margin
• Failte Feirste Thiar
• Police Stations
• The Big Fish
• Dunville Park
• Gordon Street Art Work
• St Joseph’s Church Sailortown
• Cloona House/Oasis Center
• Royal Hospital Sculptures
• TGWU Building
• Clifton House
• St Malachy’s Church
• S.B.N.I. Supporters Club
• St Dominic’s Convent
• May Street Presbyterian Church
• Jaffe Fountain
• Seamus Heaney Center
• Calder Fountain
• St John The Evangelist
• Ormeau Baths
• Indian Community Centre
• Queen’s Student Union

Royal Avenue Travel Video - Audio Transcript

Royal Avenue

Royal Avenue is a busy thoroughfare at the heart of Belfast, and always has been as the following historic footage will reveal.

            This classical film was shot on a tramcar by Sagar Mitchell and James Kenyon in May 1901 and filmed in association with three American travelling showmen.

This modern day film, which follows the same route stands in stark contrast from those early 20^th century days, although the actual street plans have changed little.

Royal Avenue hides behind one of the oldest street names in Belfast as it was once called Hercules Street after Hercules Langford Rowley who married Elizabeth Ormsby, Viscountess Langford in 1732. Hercules died in 1794.

Going back even before Hercules’ time though, this street was called Herison’s Lean and back then was probably carved out of dried mud before cobble stones were ever laid.

            The name Royal Avenue sprung up from a group of exclusive houses built in 1660. During this period Belfast was made up of five lanes containing 150 houses. At the far end where the Central Library presently stands this was also known as John Street.

The tramcar passes along Royal Avenue and takes a left turn at Castle junction, at the bottom of modern day Castle Street, then heads towards Albert Clock. Some of the Victorian style buildings still exist along Royal Avenue but most on Castle Place have been replaced with far less appealing modern day equivalents.

            Over 100 years later and public transport is no less essential as tramcars back then with signs for the Malone Road, Ormeau Road and the Lisburn Road among many others are still plying these same routes albeit in diesel powered buses.

References

http://joegraham.rushlightmagazine.com

Sagar Mitchell and James Kenyon, Early Belfast, 1901.

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