THE UNLOST RIVERS OF LONDON Pyl Brook Sutton → North Cheam → Lower Morden → West Barnes (3½ miles)
[Pyl Brook → Beverley Brook → Thames]
The Pyl Brook flows mostly unnoticed between the boroughs of Sutton and Merton, at one point forming the boundary between the two. It has a twin, the East Pyl Brook, which rises in much the same place but takes two miles to join up. It's not clear what they're named after, all I know is it can't be pylons, although hurrah we will be seeing a few of those along the way. [Google map][1898 OS map]
Once upon a time the Pyl Brook was a rural stream rising in fields near Sutton, not far from the smithy by the pond on the green. Today the Green is still there (at the northern end of the town centre), but the Pyl is at best hemmed in, at worst buried, between and beneath streets and trading estates. At least one of the very first streets is called Pylbrook Road which gives you a hope of locating it. First sight of water is from a pipe emerging through the railway embankment near Sutton Common station, best spotted from a footpath off Stayton Road. The brook is also fed by a long woody pool, securely fenced off, where I disturbed a heron unused to humans actually walking by.
The first decent view of the brook is up the side of a self-storage warehouse, enlivened at present by a splurge of autumn foliage. Alas the water then ducks under Oldfields Road (a sadly elegiac name) and promptly disappears under the car park of the Sutton Cheam Tesco Extra. There used to be filter beds here, which is one reason it was so easy to culvert the river and shoehorn in a massive supermarket. My map suggests the next open air section along Willow Walk should be pleasant but no, the woody wiggle turned out to be hidden behind further fencing, and I'm not even convinced the trees were willows.
The Pyl Brook's finest half mile, indeed the only half mile worth celebrating, begins at Hamilton Avenue Recreation Ground. You can tell it's going to be decent because Sutton council have designated it Public Right Of Way Number 2. The river emerges beside a grafittied wall and suddenly meanders off across the park rather than following its original ditch beside the path. It was diverted into this looping tongue in 2010 in an attempt to reduce flood risk to the local area, a pleasant byproduct being that it suddenly looks like a proper rippling stream rather than a stark artificial drain.
The escape attempt only lasts fifty metres as the crow flies, rather longer if you're a water molecule, and then the brook returns to being the constant companion to a shared use path. On one side are backs of gardens and on the other side a large industrial estate, i.e. sheds facing sheds, as we thread down a leafy green corridor between the two. The river is confined in a deep trench strengthened by brick or stone, with just the one dumped Santander hire bike at present (which is slowly accumulating a covering of leaves). And here come the pylons, a chain of power cables striding in from the north and plonking their metal feet down beside the Pyl Brook. The first pylon has serial number ZZU 37, if you're counting.
The Pyl Brook is the reason for the dip in the A24 at Stonecot Hill. Today the crossing is called Pylford Bridge but you can tell from its name that it used to be a lot wetter. There follows a solid mile of road-walking, the brook hidden away behind suburban avenues and occasionally switching sides. Best to start by following Garth Road and then escaping into Lynmouth Gardens, unless you really fancy walking through an abrupt industrial estate and grabbing a greasy snack from Burgers and Baps. The river is now a tamed straightened channel with fences and lock-up garages to either side, should you have the benefit of a house backing onto it.
The Pyl Brook cuts across the entrance to Morden Cemetery (to spot it, look behind the commemorative benches at the start of the avenue). It then runs alongside a modern estate where a footbridge leads to a nature reserve called Derwent Floodwash, a wet meadow designed to act as further overspill should the Pyl ever flood. This is also the point where the East Pyl Brook finally merges, just behind the dogmess bin on the corner, although it's almost impossible to see the confluence behind a screen of heaped-up undergrowth. The local foxes seemed friendly enough.
For the next three-quarters of a mile the combined river is either invisible or buried underground or both. It finally pokes out at the top of West Barnes Lane beside the level crossing, ducking underneath the railway tracks and the stairs to the footbridge. And then, heavens, it's the Pyl Brook's second Tesco Extra (New Malden edition), so best bring your Clubcard with you. The river dives round the back between the fish counter and the secondary school nextdoor, so yet again there's absolutely nothing rivery to see.
It's the Pyl Brook's final misfortune to pass beneath the multilevel road junction where the A298 breaks away from the A3, just north of Shannon Corner. It's a pedestrian's misfortune too, confined to a parallel subway before both emerge along the edge of World of Golf. Here you can enjoy everything except playing a proper game of golf, including a driving range, an equipment shop and a crazy golf course populated by dinosaurs. I like that the sheeting supporting the riverbank here is fastened down by dozens of golf clubs. And then the Pyl Brook suddenly ends, or rather merges with the Beverley Brook, a confluence you can see if you head round the other side into Beverley Park. But that's almost a 20 minute detour so not worth it, indeed almost none of this walk is really worth the effort, only the nice bit past the pylon.
