Rye House

RYE HOUSE sits on the northern edge of Hoddesdon, on the finger of the Lea Valley Regional Park where the remains of the old Rye House gatehouse still stand. There was once a thriving nursery garden industry here. In the Thirties, says the local council, the Lea Valley had ‘the world’s largest accumulation of glasshouses’. Between 1968 and 1971 much of the old nursery land was surrendered to housing, thus creating what is now known as the Hundred Acre Estate, attached to the north side of Hoddesdon. Here you can buy a basic terrace house for £200,000; a three-bedroom semi for £240,000. The 1999 version is Rye House Village, 140 houses built beside the station, where a two-bedroom flat can cost £160,000 and a three-bedroom detached house £250,000. Elsewhere in Rye House, property tends to be fairly cheap. The relative modesty of the houses here is ironic considering that there was once a plan to make Rye House into a kind of genteel pleasure garden. The plans were buried when Sir Giles Gilbert Scott’s huge power station arrived. Today a combined cycle gas turbine power station does the job. Entertainments at Rye House Stadium include go-kart, speedway and greyhound racing.