Comments on: East End Desire Paths

By: Linda Hird

Linda Hird — Thu, 14 Jul 2022 15:49:41 +0000

Love these……since childhood I’ve always used these paths…..the shortest distance between two points. Rebellious?

By: Thirty Bob

Thirty Bob — Wed, 13 Jul 2022 19:43:11 +0000

Lovely. My old obsession with desire lines and wear patterns led me to do some research in the early 90s; you’ll be pleased to hear that a GLC guide to landscaping from the 70s or 80s recommended just seeding grass in public areas and then waiting to see where people wanted/needed the paths to be, and then paving and planting appropriately. Maybe someone, somewhere is doing this…

By: Cherub

Cherub — Wed, 13 Jul 2022 14:09:31 +0000

Some lovely little diversions here. It’s nice to be a bit of a rebel at times!

By: Robin

Robin — Wed, 13 Jul 2022 12:42:45 +0000

Charming. The vagaries of human actions oblivious to any injunction to follow the rules… all delightfully described.

By: Helen Breen

Helen Breen — Wed, 13 Jul 2022 11:56:44 +0000

GA, I enjoyed your piece this morning about “Desire Paths” and the “possibility of liberation” that they offer. I think you would agree that American poet Robert Frost expressed a similar sentiment quite well.

The Road Not Taken

Robert Frost – 1874-1963

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same,

And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

By: Bernie

Bernie — Wed, 13 Jul 2022 08:12:29 +0000

Thank you, Gentle Author , for giving a name for these very human diversions; I had never before come across it.

By: Marcia Howard

Marcia Howard — Wed, 13 Jul 2022 08:06:11 +0000

Wonderful insight. We are a nation of little rebels.

By: achim

achim — Wed, 13 Jul 2022 07:00:17 +0000

All humanly apprehensible. The fence in Shadwell, of course, can’t stop anything. The landscape architects of Whitechapel have at least made an attempt. And the “mystery” in London Fields is not one for me: I prefer to walk on green grass too!

Love & Peace
ACHIM

By: Barrie Maskell

Barrie Maskell — Wed, 13 Jul 2022 06:18:10 +0000

Beautifully written.

By: Amanda Bush

Amanda Bush — Wed, 13 Jul 2022 06:14:21 +0000

In my experience, the parallel track in London Fields came into being as pedestrians sought safety from speeding cyclists.

I remember reading somewhere that Eisenhower visited a university where a large grassy quad had developed muddy tracks cutting off each corner. The provost apologised for the state of the grass, but Eisenhower asked: “Why not make paths where the students want to walk?”