Cregagh - Upper Cregagh Road

Upper Cregagh Road

Beyond the Cregagh estate the road is made up of mainly private housing and continues as far as Upper Knockbreda Road. Cregagh Library and the former home of Castlereagh Borough Council are found on this part of the road. The neighbouring Montgomery Road is the location for the Robinson Centre leisure facility and the Castlereagh campus of Belfast Metropolitan College. The area was sometimes nicknamed the "Bible belt". Immediately beyond the end of the Cregagh Road, on the opposite side of the Upper Knockbreda Road, is a forested area known as Cregagh Glen. The Upper Knockbreda Road, otherwise known as the A55 Outer Ring, was completed in 1967 to link Cregagh with the Knock area on the outskirts of east Belfast.

Some of the streets in Cregagh are named after Second World War generals (e.g. Montgomery, Alanbrooke) while a significant number are named after First World War battlefields (e.g. Picardy, Hamel). This connection with the wars reflects the numbers of people from the area who died in those wars. This was also a reason why the location was chosen for a large number of ex-servicemen's homes, with 150 of the so-called "homes fit for heroes" promised by David Lloyd George built around this area in the late 1920s. However this area, which was known locally as "the Colony", remained the only significant public housing scheme for ex-soldiers to be undertaken in Belfast in the aftermath of the First World War.

A memorial to the dead of the First World War, consisting of a Celtic Cross, was unveiled in 1929 before being rededicated in 1932 by Edward, Prince of Wales. Castlereagh council expanded the memorial a number of times during the 1990s, adding a stone for the Ulster Special Constabulary, another stone for the Ulster Defence Regiment and a back plaque commemorating members of both of these groups and the Royal Ulster Constabulary as well as civilians killed during the Troubles and local residents who died during the Second World War.