Immediately east of the club is the dead-straight road called Old North Road — this was the Roman road Ermine Street from Bishopsgate in London up to York.
It’s extremely handy for demonstrating the effects of the glider’s rudder — specifically, that it yaws the glider (turns it to point in a different direction) but doesn’t change its direction of travel. For this demonstation, you need a nice straight feature, and Old North Road fits the bill perfectly. Almost too perfectly, to be honest. When I’m trying to demonstrate this, Old North Road makes all the imperfections in my demonstrations rather too obvious. Pesky Romans with their perfectly straight roads.
On Old North Road is another historical travel feature: Old North Road! But this time, Old North Road is a railway station. It’s on the former “varsity line” railway from Cambridge to Oxford.
Those good at spotting trains might observe that there’s nowadays a small length of track and a carriage present. You can also see the railway bridge where Old North Road went (more or less) over the station.
Yet, the rebuilt Cambridge to Oxford line won’t take this (direct) route because parts of it have been built on. Instead, it will take a more loopy route from the south of Cambridge, to Cambourne north of us. We’re looking forward to seeing it get built – construction works always add interest, and very often generate thermals too, to keep us in the air!
If you’d like to see these things from above, come along to our open weekend!
Thanks to Steve Owen for checking this post and photo!
