A walk along the Thames is one of the finest London has to offer. But that walk isn't always beside the Thames, thanks to residential, commercial and industrial intrusions along the riverbank. I've attempted to walk the north bank of the Thames from the Thames Barrier to Tower Bridge to see just how un-Thamesy the Thames Path is.
edge of London
YES Rainham Marshes → Ferry Lane (3.6km)
NO Ferry Lane → Barking Riverside (3.3km)
YES Barking Riverside (footpath 47) (900m)
NO Barking Riverside → Beckton Sewage Works (3.2km)
YES Royal Albert Wharf (400m)
NO Gallions Point Marina (200m)
YES Gallions Point → North Woolwich Pier (1.5km)
NO North Woolwich Pier → Thames Barrier Park (1.5km) Thames Barrier
YES Thames Barrier Park → Royal Wharf(800m)
Thames Barrier Park has provided landscaped access to the river since 2000, but the subsequent promenade is a fairly recent opening thanks to the super-dense Royal Wharf development. At present the path halts at the top of Royal Wharf Pier but should one day connect through to Lyle Park, at present a much more isolated affair.
NO Lyle Park → Bow Creek(1.3km)
One day the Thames Wharf development may replace industrial sprawl and waste disposal depots with hundreds of gleaming flats, but until then your best chance of enjoying this grimy shoreline is looking down from the Dangleway.
YES Trinity Buoy Wharf(100m)
NO Goodluck Hope(200m)
100 metres isn't really long enough to describe as a 'walk', especially when it's hidden up a dead end, but TBW is always worth a visit. The adjacent housing estate, currently under construction, might eventually open up a bit more waterfront but good luck hoping it'll all connect together.
YES East India Dock → Virginia Wharf(350m)
NO Blackwall Yard(160m)
This is a lovely stretch with lock gates, a Jamestown memorial and views of the Dome from a bend in the river. But all too swiftly it goes wrong, blocked by a car park and a communications centre, and to get back on track requires a half mile diversion.
YES New Providence Wharf(200m)
This luxury residential development owes much of its value to its riverside setting, and residents have been gifted a timbered boardwalk for smoothie-sipping and yoga. But the management have stuck up notices to remind non-residents that the Thames pathway is for "passive use" only, which means no cycling, no alcohol and even no photography, the stuck-up miseryguts.
NO Northumberland Wharf → Pierhead Lock(550m)
Tower Hamlets' recycling centre and waste transfer station requires containers to be swung off by crane, hence no pedestrians. Then beyond that housing gets in the way, most of it modern but with a few charming Georgian townhouses plus a weatherboarded pub. By the time you've diverted along the main road you've crossed onto the Isle of Dogs proper.
YES Isle of Dogs Pumping Station(100m)
NO 1 and 2 Folly Wall(20m)
YES Capstan Square → Island Gardens(1.7km)
Hurrah, at last a decent stretch of riverside walking. Every house and apartment block for the next mile is set back from the bank, all except numbers 1 and 2 Folly Wall, a pair of very ordinary-looking houses which just happen to have back gardens ending at the Thames. Whoever granted this brief suburban blockage planning permission, probably some time in the 1980s, can't have realised the Thames Path would one day be a thing. But the following mile is a joy, wiggling round beaches and jetties as Royal Greenwich gradually comes into view and peaks opposite Island Gardens. n.b. the riverside is currently blocked at New Union Wharf while new flats are built, but won't be forever.
NO Poplar Boat Club → Felstead Wharf(250m)
Step back for the rowing club, sandwiched between a "boutique development" (80% sold) and an older estate which gets to hog its own stretch of dead end riverfront.
YES St David's Square → Masthouse Terrace(1km)
NO Falcon Heliport → Arnhem Wharf(600m)
Burrells Wharf, where the SS Great Eastern was launched, was transformed into a private estate in the late 1980s. Its open riverside promenade makes for a decent long walk. A hidden heliport eventually breaks the chain, then three separate housing developments conspire to keep their Thamesside to themselves. Ten minutes spent bashing Westferry Road instead is no treat.
YES Arnhem Wharf → Narrow Street(1.6km)
This is a fine stroll up the western side of the Isle of Dogs, skirting Canary Wharf behind a skyscraper nobody yet has the money to build, then curving round into Limehouse. It feels like much more than a mile. If you haven't been keeping count, the good news is that 80% of the perimeter of the Isle of Dogs benefits from public access.
NO/YES/NO Narrow Street(300m/200m/200m)
Narrow Street's been here for ages, so the riverside was always for living on and trading from rather than a nice walk. Occasionally a public walkway has been gifted, either side of the exit from Limehouse Basin, but mainly we're doing street walking now.
YES Phoenix Wharf → King Edward Memorial Park(500m)
At last a breakout along a broad promenade past Atlantic Wharf and the brick ziggurat of Free Trade Wharf. Normally King Edward Memorial Park enjoys recreational waterfront, but that's been temporarily swallowed up by Thames Tideway Tunnel works. It'll look better later.
NO Shadwell Basin → Arnhem Wharf(50m)
YES Trafalgar Court(100m)
NO Prospect of Whitby → Wapping Pier Head(1km)
It gets bitty here, tediously, first an alleyway to skirt the exit from Shadwell Basin and then an unnecessary boardwalk behind Trafalgar Court. But that's still better, riverwise, than a long trek along the cobbles of Wapping Wall and Wapping High Street. Occasional stairs lead down to the water, but the lack of general access is a consequence of a neighbourhood whose origins go back centuries rather than decades.
YES Capital Wharf → St Katharine's Way(500m)
NO HMS President → St Katharine Docks(600m)
Here's a splash of luxury living as we approach the City, first a pristine promenade, then Hermitage Riverside Memorial Garden, then an easily missed boardwalk round the back of Tower Bridge Wharf. Again it doesn't last, the Thames Path having lost its identity somewhat since we left the Isle of Dogs.
YES St Katharine Docks → Tower Bridge(150m)
I'll stop here, as we finally reach London's lowest bridging point. Since leaving the Isle of Dogs only 40% of the Thames Path has been beside the Thames, which isn't great. But along the entire eight miles since the Thames Barrier it's the other way round, with 60% of the riverside accessible. That's good, but maybe not as good as you'd have hoped the Thames Path would be. Should you continue it gets much better, though, with a full 4km of Thames embankment to enjoy between the Tower of London and the Houses of Parliament. Pick your section carefully if you want to enjoy the best Thames Path experience.
This is the pedestrian crossing in the centre of the Olympic Park.
It connects the southern half to the northern half.
It's an example of a straight-across single stage crossing.
To get your bearings this is Waterden Road, the busiest road in the Olympic Park connecting Westfield to the A12. A separate minor road joins at a T-junction just to the left. This was once the most pedestrian-friendly crossing in East London, likewise the most vehicle-hating, thanks to a green man phase lasting far longer than was generally ever necessary. The T-junction is now being drastically remodelled which means temporary lights have been installed for well over a year, and their changing cycle is much less generous.
The precise location of this junction isn't important, I'm just using it as an example of a crossing that makes you wait on the pavement much longer than is technically necessary.
If you turn up here as a pedestrian 🚶 you are very unlikely to find the green man green. The green man phase lasts for just six seconds, whereas red lasts more like a minute.
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That's six seconds of green, meaning cross, followed by nine seconds of no illuminated man at all, followed by a minute of red. In reality most people who arrive during the 'dark' phase are going to start crossing anyway, perhaps at hastened pace, interpreting the lack of man as "hurry up". So far, so normal.
Here's what the traffic 🚗 closest to you sees.
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A red traffic light shows initially while pedestrians are crossing. Then the lights turn green and vehicles on the main road get about half a minute of flow. The lights then change back to red while traffic exiting the side road gets priority, after which the cycle repeats.
During the final half minute the traffic in front of you is going nowhere so you could cross to the central refuge in perfect safety. But annoyingly the signal stays red because this is a straight-across single stage crossing. Loitering in the centre is not approved. Nothing by halves. All or nothing.
Here's what's happening with traffic 🚓 on the other side of the road.
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This time there are two flows, first from the main road and then from the sideroad, totalling almost a full minute. That's why the straight-across single stage crossing keeps you on the pavement. But there's always a gap in the middle of that minute because traffic takes a few seconds to emerge from the sideroad. If you were standing on the central refuge you could easily nip across and complete your crossing. Nipping across, however, is never taken into account when phasing lights.
TfL have to assume that pedestrians are slow and saintly, for example in a wheelchair, using a walking stick or pushing a child. But you're probably not, indeed recent research shows that 80% of Londoners cross within 30 seconds of arriving at a pedestrian crossing irrespective of whether or not a green man is shown, and more than 50% cross within five seconds of arriving no matter what. In real life sinners outnumber saints by a considerable margin.
This particular crossing has a red man phase lasting over a minute, much longer than 30 seconds, suggesting that most people turning up on red will cross anyway. I usually do. Observation confirms that I am not alone. The big danger, however, comes just before the traffic lights turn green. As a pedestrian it's not possible to tell that the lights are about to change colour because every traffic light is screened from your view, making it all too easy to step out at precisely the wrong moment.
More helpful would be a straight-across two stage crossing, because each side of the road could be signalled differently. Pedestrians would be invited to cross safely to the central refuge during a period of almost half a minute, not just six seconds. There'd still be a wait on the other side, but the risk-taker would have a much better chance of being able to nip through a gap in the traffic... which in this case is actually scheduled.
Alas TfL don't believe in straight-across two stage crossings. They worry, perhaps rightly, that pedestrians will choose to see the green man on the far side rather than the red man halting immediate passage. Sometimes TfL install those horrible louvre strips to try to ensure that this green man is only visible when you're halfway across, but all this tends to do is make the green man annoyingly hard to see. In some circumstances staggered crossings are installed instead, but these have a nasty habit of slowing pedestrians down by adding a faff of a walk in the middle.
Paris trusts its citizens to use straight-across two stage crossings, erecting signs saying 'Traversez en 2 temps' where this is the case. It's not rocket science to learn to look at one signal for half the road and another signal for the other half.
But in London straight-across single stage crossings are the default, even on the widest roads, often without a central refuge to aid a jaywalker's passage. These are all well and good for the slow and saintly but, for the 80% of us who are going to lose patience and try to cross anyway, a straight-across two stage crossing might actually be a lot safer.
Three inches of rain in three days has defeated me. I went out for a walk on Friday (and got wet), and I went out for a walk on Saturday (and got wet), but on Sunday I stayed indoors all day for the first time since mid-May. So, in the absence of anything new to tell you, I thought I'd trawl back to 5th October in years past and see if there was anything I didn't tell you about at the time.
Saturday 5th October 2019:Luton
I was actually going to Dunstable (sigh, I miss mundane provincial exploration) and up onto the Downs (sigh, I miss proper hills with proper views), and I blogged aboutboth of those. But to get there I went via Luton, a town I used to know well, and took a brief look around. The bus station's had a considerable spruce up since the 1990s, its bleak expanse of tarmac having been gifted a teardrop-shaped drop-in in one corner. Officially this is the Arriva Luton Travel Centre, but mostly it's a Starbucks with an information desk in one corner, and proved unexpectedly difficult to extract a timetable from. The cut-through to the shopping centre is less grim than it once was, overlooked by a mural stating If You Can Dream It You Must Do It which I consider to be very poor municipal advice. The Mall was busy but less big-branded than when it was an Arndale, with the market still the place where people with even less cash hang out. I walked a brisk loop round George Street and concluded that Luton had changed even more than I had.
Friday 5th October 2018:Audley End/Saffron Walden
We went to Audley End, but I blogged about that at the time, and then we ticked off everything Saffron Walden has to offer, but I blogged about that too. Pretty much all I didn't blog about were the textiles exhibition, the tortoise-carving and the fish fingers & chippy spuds dinner. I have nothing more to give.
Thursday 5th October 2017:180 The Strand
This Brutalist office block is being rebuilt so in 2016 opened itself up as an occasional space for the presentation of modern art. I've blogged about various exhibitions but not this one, which opened today, whose highlight was Ryoji Ikeda's Insta-friendly oscillating digital floor (shoes off please). I also enjoyed the digital waterfall and Arthur Jafa's 'Love is the Message, the Message is Death', but the best bit as always was walking round a gutted building and its grubby backstairwells. Sadly every consecutive exhibition has toured smaller and smaller portions of the interior, and reopening as a creative hub doesn't look like such a great idea now.
Sunday 5th October 2014:Severndroog Castle
Yesterday (that's 2020 yesterday) was the day of the annual Thames Barrier full testclosure. I didn't go because it was raining, but mostly because when I went in 2014 the weather was pitch perfect blue-sky-tastic and I doubt that's beatable. Blogged that, obviously, as well as a trip up to the top of Severndroog Castle afterwards. But what I never got round to mentioning was the walk from the foot of the tower to the cafe in Oxleas Wood. BestMate's Other Half insisted they knew which way to go, based on what their smartphone told them, and started to head off in the general direction of Shooters Hill. I insisted we could be there in half the time if we took the direct route through Jack Wood along something called a 'footpath', which Google Maps didn't recognise because it had assumed we were in a car. Google's skewed view of the world, favouring vehicles and marketable businesses, should never be your travel default.
Saturday 5th October 2013:Northern line south
One thing I've discovered looking back at 5th Octobers past is how often I got two blogposts out of a single day trip. On this occasion I went to admire the architecture of stations on the Northern line (post one) and visited Colliers Wood's ridiculous Bridge To Nowhere (post two). That bridge does now go somewhere, I'm pleased to say, but I've blogged that too so am increasingly unconvinced that this nostalgic trawling of days past is working.
Sunday 5th October 2008:Battersea Park
This was the day the revamped Shepherds Bush station opened, in preparation for Westfield, so I went along early and blogged that. Then I went to Battersea Park to watch a boy I was at school with, now thirty years older, fire fifty coloured flares across the grass and call it art. It made for another blogpost, now replete with dead links, but I've never blogged my extraordinary photo of a billowing greyhound before so here it is a dozen years later.
Friday 5th October 2007:Westminster
This was quite a day at work. When I got the job our team had a contract by default, which was nice, but later it was spun out to competitive tender and we had to fight other companies to retain it. This involved writing a massive document promising the world and, on this particular morning, giving a 40 minute presentation to people we'd previously worked alongside. I got to do six of those minutes, thankfully competently, and adroitly skated over a sourcing issue during the Q&A. Then in the afternoon we threw a leaving party for my Project Support Officer who was off to a more reliable job in Stevenage. I bought her a John Lewis voucher, but was later taken to one side by a female colleague and told it would have been better if I'd picked somewhere that sold shoes instead.
Saturday 5th October 2002:Camden
I hadn't yet been blogging a month, but still managed to recount my shoe shop purchasing exploits and my ghastly hiccuping nightbus ride home from a night's drinking in the West End. Things not mentioned: attending a gig at the Camden Barfly, complimenting the lead singer in the urinals, meeting a Radio 3 producer under the stairs and the inordinate length of time uploading a new album to your portable mp3 player used to take.
Friday 5th October 2001:Guernsey
My parents were just about to celebrate their Ruby Wedding so the whole family flew over to Guernsey to spend a long weekend celebrating there. Alas, even for October, the weather was poor. Later in the weekend we'd revisit the German Underground Hospital, watch the grandchildren trampolining, stand on a causeway in gale force winds, poke limpets and endure the anniversary meal from hell in the hotel conservatory ("sorry the tables are too small and we forgot your drinks and the steak is wrong, now would you mind hurrying up because the Saga party are due in for a quiz at half past eight"). But on the Friday night, after a late flight, there was only time for half a lager in the bar before going to bed.
The only other 5th October I've ever blogged about is the day I started university, a date that's somehow now 37 years in the past. Here's hoping the weather clears up this week and I can get out and tell you something new.
