A real Hawker Hunter jet — a Cold War-era British fighter that first flew in 1951 — sits on a steel plinth on a Basingstoke roundabout near Black Dam, pointing skyward as though about to take off. It is one of those bits of street furniture that should be incongruous but somehow works, a sleek silver arrow rising above the traffic.
Hawker Aircraft had a strong association with the area and the Hunter was one of the company's most successful designs, exported to more than 20 air forces. Hunters set world speed records and remained in front-line service into the 1980s. The plane is best photographed at dusk or from the cycle path that loops around the roundabout's edge.