Mention open-air cinema and images of parks, piazzas and country houses spring to mind. Now, though, you can add urban flyovers to this list.
Located in the undercroft where the A12 crosses the Lea Navigational Canal in East London, Folly for a Flyover is screening films every weekend until the end of the month. The unusual venue is certainly not picnic-hamper territory. But that hasn't deterred thousands of people from walking or cycling (despite its car-heavy location there is no parking) to watch movies from Snow White and the Seven Dwarves to Tron as part of the arts festival CREATE.
Volunteers from Assemble, the team who last year turned a derelict Islington petrol station into a picture palace, have constructed a temporary building on the site, while screenings and performances will take place outside.
And it is far from the only event to be hidden in our underpasses. This month the pop-up street table tennis project PING! has chosen Spaghetti Junction as one of its Birmingham locations, while a few miles away jazz musician Soweto Kinch is finalising plans for the fourth Flyover Show, a live music event on 20 August under the A41 at Hockley Circus.
Kinch, who lives locally, wanted to reclaim the graffiti-covered space for public use. Organiser Clare Edwards admits the setting has technical challenges but there is an added bonus. When it rained last year "it was like being under a great big concrete umbrella".
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