Well, as it turned out, the disease was the cure. The Cannon Street Bridge, completed the same year that cursed London with the Final Catastrophe and blessed the world with the genius of H. G. Wells, stands as a testament to the ways in which the London of yesterday came to be the London of today, of how population and progress are intrinsically connected, and, indeed, of utopian dreams realized. For London’s nineteenth-century population boom forced the city to confront its most horrific challenges. There was simply no other option. The choice was clear: adapt or perish.
The cannon street railway
