This road was re-built after the enclosure of Bromley Common in 1821.  Originally it was called Turnpike Road because it was built and maintained by ‘The New Cross Turnpike Trust.’  Turnpike trusts charged people for using their roads.  The money was used to pay back the investors and to repair the road.  Until turnpikes were introduced, roads were the responsibility of the parish.  Most parishes had difficulty in maintaining the roads in their area so most roads were bad, often very bad 

The money was collected at tollgates, (a bit like the modern tolls at the Dartford Crossings).  The nearest tollgate was at the top of Mason Hill just before Bromley.  The aim was to get as much money as possible from coaches, goods wagons and drovers driving animals to market.  Landowners who allowed travellers to pass over their land to avoid the toll could be fined. 

Not everyone paid.  Pedestrians, the Royal Family, soldiers on the march, church goers on Sundays, clergymen visiting the sick, funeral processions, agricultural equipment and manure, and horses going to water did not pay.  Coaches carrying the Royal Mail not only did not have to pay but the gate keeper had to have the gate open so that they could go through at speed.  The coachman blew a post horn to warn of his coming. 

A condition of running a turnpike road was that milestones had to be placed every mile.  There is one on the main road close to the school (see left), there is another in Bromley High Street.  They stopped collecting the toll in 1865.