In normal times, tourists would disembark the Jubilee Line at St John’s Wood and walk down Grove End Road to imitate The Beatles’ famous album cover outside Abbey Road Studios.¹ On my morning runs I’d usually see a group gathered outside the studios hoping to dodge the traffic for a moment to take their souvenir photo.

Today there was nobody.

As the world enters lockdown we’ll see many more photos of tourist attractions, business centres, and sports stadiums devoid of people. Right now, these photos seem strange: the very absence of people from our shared places makes them feel lonely, spare, and purposeless. Without tourists and Beatles fans, this is just a pedestrian crossing. Without traffic, it barely need serve that purpose.

News organisations should share these photos: they are evidence that people are following guidance to stay home, and that is newsworthy. On Friday evening, after Boris Johnson announced pubs must close, thousands descended on their locals to get in one last pint. It was disheartening to see people wilfully miss the point, but at least we’re now seeing that people can and will listen to government guidance.

However, when we look back at the Covid-19 crisis I don’t think we’ll reflect too hard on photos of empty streets and spaces, precisely because they are empty. This crisis wasn’t caused by people, but people can manage it, and images of what people have done and will do will have far greater lasting impact. Not all of that is good: raiding supermarkets shelves is a selfish and unproductive approach to the coming weeks.² But in others we will see the very best of humanity, and we should record and celebrate their efforts.

All of this is to say that my photo of Abbey Road is fairly pointless; a momentary capture of an unusually quiet morning in North London.