the project was actually part of the bbc’s northern exposure ‘writing in the margins’ initiative, spearheaded by the corporation's then creative director of new writing, kate rowland. adams led the workshops for a year with exercises, discussions and readings, and it was she who coined the group's title. the term ‘blokes’ was certainly being used by the time the group featured in ariel in december 2002. in april 2003, the focus of the project – king of the road, a six-part serial telling of the comings and goings of a local (fictional) taxi firm – received its first public reading in the haworth arms on hull's beverley road.