I noticed these large metal structures in various spots around London. These two near Kings Cross have some sort of resident buildings inside of them but I saw more of these structures that didn’t have anything in them, than those that did. A few out the window on the train to Brussels and one near the Beefeater distillery come to mind.
Apologies if this has been asked before. I tried searching but have no idea what to call these.
TIA!
by Less-Damage9997
12 comments
I think they’re old gas storage tanks. They’d lower into the ground as they emptied.
Is that Coals drop yard?
Gasometers, there used to be loads of them. They were for local storage of town gas before we accessed natural gas and build a national pipe network.
> Gasholders Nos. 10, 11 and 12 were built for the storage of town gas for Pancras Gasworks, the largest gasworks in London.
>
> The gasholders were originally constructed in 1860-67 and enlarged in 1879-80 with new interconnected guide frames and telescopic lifts.
>
> Gas was manufactured here using coal from the Imperial Gas, Light and Coke Company until the late 20th Century when the gasworks was decommissioned.
https://heritagecalling.com/2020/07/15/a-brief-introduction-to-gasholders/
Homes
[Gas holder](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gas_holder)
This one at Kings Cross is obviously decommissioned and converted.
Yep, gas holders – the ones at King’s Cross are called the Siamese Triplet. They were purposely kept and regenerated for the new development there. See this for background/history…… https://www.kingscross.co.uk/gasholders-10-11-12
I moved from Canada and lived in London a while back.
I always passed the old Kent road Gas holder
And it seems cool that it’s part of historic list. In North America these things would have been demolished by now. Thx for sharing
https://historicengland.org.uk/listing/the-list/list-entry/1446329
Bagleys (those that know, know)
Troll post?
it was really interesting to see this work. What you see now is the frame within which was a giant telescopic cylinder that held the town gas and would go up and and down (very slowly) as it filled and emptied. when this site was being re-developed they dismantled the frame and laid the parts in a stack on site waiting to be re-erected around the new buildings. search gasometer or gasholder and you find lots of videos about them
Here’s an article on Gas Holders that’ll explain [https://heritagecalling.com/2020/07/15/a-brief-introduction-to-gasholders/](https://heritagecalling.com/2020/07/15/a-brief-introduction-to-gasholders/)
[https://gasholderslondon.co.uk/](https://gasholderslondon.co.uk/)