I see that the Royal Borough of Greenwich has a consultation out about what people feel about the Riverside Path. I’m not sure how ethical it is for me to put my fairly detailed research about the path into the public arena at this stage, but I can’t really see why not.
Of course, the path goes all the way through Greenwich – the longest stretch of any ‘riparian boundary’ area of any London borough. It goes from Upper Watergate in Deptford, at the Lewisham boundary, all the way down to where it joins the Bexley boundary in the wilds of Thamesmead. This takes in some interesting areas.
Of course, the first Deptford stretch isn’t on the actual riverside in that it takes us along Borthwick Street and then crosses the Creek.
It then goes along an incredibly boring newish riverside walkway to what we all know at Cutty Sark and the famous bit of Royal Greenwich. Then on to the Peninsula of which more below.
Beyond that it goes down through Charlton to a point at the Thames Barrier which was completely blocked until only a few years ago.
Then it ends for a bit at the Woolwich ferry and picks up again to go through Woolwich. At one time you were unable to go any further at the Arsenal wall and you certainly couldn’t go through the Arsenal itself. However these days the walk continues on through what was the Arsenal ending in a longish fairly wild section with bushes and undergrowth right the way down to Thamesmead.
All of it is interesting with lots to see.
Everyone that I’ve spoken to seems to take it for granted that what the council is talking about is the stretch between Pelton Road and Angerstein Wharf – that is the traditional path and has been written about by lots of people, including me.
My copy of ‘Nairn’s London’ is falling to bits. When I bought it in 1966 (price 8/6d) it was the brave new world but now it’s a historical document. One of the reasons it’s so tatty is Nairn’s description of the Riverside path “unknown and unnamed … the best Thameside walk in London”.
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I guess it was originally just a walk along the river wall – and we have no idea how old that is.
In 1867 the Court of Queen’s Bench heard that it was there at the time of Norman Conquest and for all they knew it was Roman.
The public have walked it ever since but now no longer on the river edge because of the need for a cycle path and ‘health and safety’.
Planting between the river and the people means you can’t see the river – which is what you came to see in the first place
Of the oldest pictures of the area which show people on the path, both of them are of the 17th century gunpowder works (on the site of Enderbys).
In them people are taking the dog for a walk, sketching, chatting… or just, well, walking. A few years ago the Enderby Group did a footfall survey on the path – and things haven’t really changed, except for the bicycles. Today with so many residents living so close to the path in all the new flats there must be an enormously increased footfall.
Nairn describes the path starting at the Blackwall Tunnel’s ‘pretty art nouveau gatehouse’ down a passage alongside the Delta Metal Company “which zigs and it zags and it doesn’t give up and eventually comes out at the river”. It’s a bit different now because from where he started, at Ordnance Draw Dock, you couldn’t follow the path round the gas works, but it now continues all the way round the Dome.
I would like to think that whoever operates the Dome might do something a bit more imaginative with that stretch of the path. I do remember being herded into a room to meet the developer who was going to take the Dome over and tell us what they were going to do. I, in all innocence, asked in what way they intended to relate the development to the river. They looked surprised – River? they said questioningly. They didn’t seem to be aware it was there or that they should do anything at all to acknowledge it. Which is a pity – but then they’re all Americans!
North of this in 1868 Lewis and Stockwell, shipbuilders, built a large a dry dock (where the hotel is now) and this interrupted and blocked the river path. I don’t know how this was resolved then by the Vestry who thought it was ‘not a good idea to give up these old rights in a hurry’ but they also thought new employment opportunities were important. (Nothing changes, it really doesn’t). The remains of the dry dock lie somewhere under the Dome.
One of the wharves in that area had a lot of lively workers who claimed they kept finding Roman remains as the Dome site was cleared – saying ‘I’ve put them all in my aquarium, love’.
When the Gas Works was built in the 1890s the riverside path was closed right round its site. Following an enquiry in the House of Lords, Ordnance Draw Dock was built by the gas company as compensation. A sort of 19th century planning gain. I hope Greenwich residents visit this draw dock which is still a right of way despite scary notices from the people in the Dome and the Hotel. You can’t access it for its proper use as a draw dock because you can’t park a car down there and you can’t use a draw dock without a vehicle.
So off we go down the path – and I’m pleased to see that Bullet From a Shooting Star is still there. I always thought it is very much the best of the sculptures which have been put in by the various developers.
Ian Nairn was writing in 1966 – about the world we have lost when the river really was the River with lots of boats and the path was lined with interesting industries – or at least I think they were interesting. He talked about the path taking ‘exciting forms… between walls … under cranes … nipping round the back of a boatyard’. Much of that stretch was straightened out in the 1980s. “A continuous flirtation with the slow-moving river choked with working boats” (if only!)
In 1867 the right of way on this whole stretch was taken to the Court of Queen’s Bench by Greenwich Vestry in a case against the shipbuilders, Maudslay Son and Field who had blocked the path. They were on the site we now call Bay Wharf where now there is the boat yard built by Morden College to compensate for the loss of Pipers – and because it meant the nearest boat repair business would be up in Ipswich.
Here Maudslay built Cutty Sark’s two sisters, Hallowe’en and Blackadder.
That 1867 Court case had huge public support and the gallery was crowded with local people shouting and clapping. Counter evidence came from Mr. Soames whose soap works was on the site of the later sugar refinery. He said that companies would go out of business if the public could walk along the riverside past them.
The Court and Lord Chief Justice Cockburn didn’t agree and declared in favour of the right of way. It is the same stretch which Greenwich Council went to court about in the 1990s when the then occupants blocked it, and the right of way was declared again.
In 2000 there was a development agency in place for East Greenwich and they were employing a full-time worker on the Riverside Path. He was an interesting young bloke, and he worked very hard to get it all together. There seemed to be some hope that it could be modernised and made more available but in a tactful sort of way. Of course, he didn’t last and although the council put various young planners in charge of it they always had other jobs and priorities.
I soon discovered that there were a range of agencies which had all sorts of rights on the path. There were always complaints, and I guess there still are, from members of the public because ‘the Council had closed the path’. But sometimes the council didn’t even know the path was closed until someone rang in and complained.
There were bodies – and they must still exist – with various rights. The foreshore is owned by the Crown and the Environment Agency seems to be able to do what it likes there. The path also has stretches where it is privately owned. I remember that the Enderby Group discovered by accident that a drain was to be built across the path by a maritime body based in Newcastle – who clearly knew nothing whatsoever about Greenwich and the sensitivities around the path.
I do not doubt that the council planners do their best. They set a formula many years ago for what they thought the path should be like – paved and decent and with a band of planting between the path and the river for safety reasons. It meant that the view of the river was very much curtailed, although of course there is not much to see these days.
I have always felt that we should at least try and preserve the memory of the working river – it was an exciting place. It might have been dirty and dangerous and exploitative and lots of things but there was always something going for it which was interesting and exciting at the same time. I miss so much the noise of it – all the different hoots which told us all what was in port and where it was going.
As for Nairn – he got to the “final exciting stretch past Greenwich Power Station and another good riverside pub, The Yacht”. Then he says, “God preserve it from the prettifiers” and, in a footnote, “They are trying to close it. Walk it as you would a country path, till they are sick to the guts.”
Well .. ok…
(My books on it: Greenwich Marsh, 1999 no longer available; Greenwich Peninsula. Greenwich Marsh. 2020 Amazon; The Greenwich Riverside: Upper Watergate to Angerstein. 2021 Amazon)
