Barrie Farnsworth looks at the fascinating history of one of Derbyshire’s most famous roads, the A6.
WHEN the nation’s roads were first ‘classified and numbered’, the A6 was England’s longest road. The Barnet (north London) to Carlisle route, which goes through the heart of Derbyshire, was designated the A6 in 1921 by William Rees-Jeffries, head of the Roads Board, who spent seven long years numbering all the A- and B-roads across the nation.
Back then, the A6 was not the UK’s longest road – that honour went to the London to Edinburgh A1, but it was certainly England’s longest…