Wandering around Liverpool Street Station, and a small dark alley contains an unexpected gem — an old map of London. Put there for visitors, it’s hardly an appealing location, which is also possibly why it has been overlooked for all these years.

I’d left my glasses at home, but couldn’t see a date on it anywhere, and suspect that the damp patch now conceals the revealing information, but it is possible to date it to no later than 1986.

Up to 1986, Lloyds of London sat a couple of streets along from its current location, and it is the older location shown on the map.

Other notable changes compared to today are the presence of the NatWest Tower and the Baltic Exchange.

As it was on the 10th April 1992 that the IRA detonated a bomb that would destroy the Baltic Exchange resulting in a Gherkin for a replacement, and lead to a refurbished Natwest Tower becoming Tower 42.

Also notice the Spitalfields Flower Market, which burnt down in 1995

By all rights, the map shouldn’t be there at all. Not because it should have been replaced with a more up to date one, but because in 1988, there were plans to demolish the building it stands in. As that building includes the Victorian era Arcade of shops, there were protests, which not only saved The Arcade, but also this relic of 1980s London.

It’s a modest little curiosity, this decades old faded map, but quite a fun one to seek out, and show off to impress friends with your knowledge of little known London nooks.

You can find it here, next to the M&S just outside The Arcade.