Bizarre London sign with directions to California finally corrected after 15 years | UK News
A mysterious road sign in south London with directions to two destinations in California has finally been corrected after 15 years.
The bizarre sign in Southwark tells drivers what lane to go into if they’re heading to Malibu or Laurel Canyon.
Although the US does share place names with the UK (there’s a village called California in Norfolk) there is no Malibu or Laurel Canyon in the capital.
When asked, many locals admitted they’d never noticed the sign, although others said they think it was altered around 2010.
A similar sign on the opposite side of the road points drivers to lanes for the actual London destinations of Rotherhithe and Peckham, a little less glamorous than their Los Angeles counterparts, home to the rich and famous.
Southwark Council has now fixed the incorrect sign so the two mirror each other.
Joyce Kirton has walked past the altered sign numerous times but admitted she’d never before noticed that the destinations it pointed to were half the world away from her home city.
‘I have never noticed that – and I’ve lived here for 30-odd years,’ the 60-year-old said.
‘Maybe it’s a joke, but I walk this way loads and I’ve never noticed it before.’
Christy, from Ireland, now lives opposite the sign and said it had shown the US names the three years he’s lived in south London.
‘It has always been here,’ the 29-year-old, who works in marketing, said.
‘I don’t know if it’s an inside joke or something.
‘I guess it’s a bit of a laugh. I noticed the Malibu sign but, myself not being British, I didn’t know if there was somewhere in southeast London called Malibu.’
Gabriel and Lorena, from the Italian island of Sardinia, said that they, too, presumed Malibu and Laurel Canyon were in London.
‘I thought maybe it was twinned with somewhere else,” Lorena admitted.
“We have that in Italy. I thought it was a genuine sign for somewhere in London.’
Gabriel joked: ‘Maybe Malibu really is in that direction.’
Christy’s housemate, who only moved in a few months ago, added: ‘I spotted it as soon as I moved in.
‘It reminds me of being in LA.’
Cllr James McAsh, cabinet member for clean air, streets and waste at Southwark Council, said: ‘You’d be forgiven for confusing Rotherhithe with Malibu or Laurel Canyon as popular places to live where history and nature meet.
‘That might explain why the sign has gone under our radar and we are now in the midst of amending it.’
Malibu and Laurel Canyon both lie in the Santa Monica Mountain region of LA, with the latter forming part of the Hollywood Hills and once home to 60s music icons such as Jim Morrison, Joni Mitchell and Frank Zappa lived.
Courtney Cox, Julia Roberts, Johan Hill and Paris Hilton are some of the stars who currently have homes in Malibu, famed for its strip of beaches.