Deptford & Greenwich: Some pictures from two bike rides in April 2005, the second cut rather short by a puncture, around one of my favourite areas of London, mainly along the southern bank of the River Thames. The area has changed fairly dramatically in recent years with new blocks of riverside flats replacing riverside industry, much of which had already ceased work by 2005. I first photographed here around 1980 and it still now makes an interesting walk (or ride) and I’ve done most or all of it a few times since 2005.
River Thames and Drydock, North Greenwich.
As usual I’ll post a slightly amended version of what I wrote at the time on My London Diary together with links to that site which has some more pictures. But I didn’t write anything about the actual pictures except the captions.
Reflection of the Laban building in Deptford Creek, London.
It was a fine sunny day on Thursday 21 April 2005 and I put my Brompton folding bike on the train to Waterloo, then cycled east from there to Deptford and Geenwich, taking another trip along one of my favourite riverside paths around the Greenwich Peninsula.
Trinity Square, Southwark, London SE1. Church is now a rehearsal studio
North Greenwich is still interesting, although the area by the Dome is now rather bleak. Time went surprisingly quickly, and I had only got just past the Dome when it was time to make my way back.
Dry Dock, North Greenwich, London.
Just over a week later I tried to take up the ride from where I left off, but only made it as far as the footbridge over Deptford Creek, when I heard a loud bang as my rear tyre punctured. I should have stopped, mended the puncture and gone on, but I couldn’t face it.
Deptford Creek close to its junction with RIver Thames, Deptford, London.
I wheeled the bike to Greenwich station, got on the train and came home. One of my few gripes about the Brompton is that mending punctures is a bit of a pain; the small tyres are hard to take off and even harder to replace, and if you want to take the rear wheel off, it is a rather tricky business that I’ve yet to master. I have tyres with kevlar inserts that are supposed to be puncture-resistant, but they don’t seem very effective.
Canary Wharf and River Thames from North Greenwich, London
After I’d arrived home and had a cup of coffee, the puncture turned out to be a straightforward job.
Ship breaker’s yard, North Greenwich, London, April 2005Doorway, Albury St, Deptford,St Pauls, Deptford, London built by Thomas Archer in 1713Laban dance centreDeptford Creek
Lewisham Hospital, Greenwich Peninsula, Syria & Mali: As often when I had a long break between two events I took the opportunity to take an extensive walk in one of my favourite areas of London and on Friday 15th February I went to the Thames Path at Greenwich after a lunchtime protest at Lewisham Hospital. Then I went to Whitehall for a small protest against Western military intervention in Mali and Syria and a possible attack on Iran.
Fight to Save Lewisham Hospital Continues
A lunchtime rally at the war memorial opposite the Hospital made clear that the fight by the entire local community to save services at their hospital was continuing.
As well as a legal challenge there were to be further mass demonstrations including a ‘Born in Lewisham Hospital’ protest the following month.
Lewisham Mayor Sir Steve Bullock
People in the area and all concerned with the future of the NHS were appalled by Jeremy Hunt’s decision to accept to the proposals for closure, which are medically unsound and would lead to more patients dying, but they would result in a huge waste of public funds.
The financial problem that led to the proposal was caused not by Lewisham but by a disastrous PFI (private finance initiative) agreement to build a hospital a few miles away.
As I wroteL “Lewisham is a successful and financially sound hospital which has received sensible public investment to provide up to date services, and the services that will be cut there will have to be set up again and provided elsewhere by other hospitals. Closing Lewisham will not only incur high costs, but will result in the waste of the previous investment in its facilities.”
Louise Irvine, the Chair of Save Lewisham Hospital Campaign
In making his decision Hunt deliberately set out to mislead the public by describing the replacement of A&E as only a small reduction in A&E services. The proposed urgent care centre could only deal with around 30% of the cases currently being covered. Similar the replacement of the current maternity service by a midwife only unit could only deal with around 10% of current births – and life-threatening transfers would be necessary if complications rose in these.
I took a bus to North Greenwich and tried to walk along the Thames Path, parts of which had reopened after a long closure. It was a warm day for February and started off sunny, though later the weather changed giving some dramatic skies.
The path from Delta Wharf and north to Drawdock Road was still vlosed but beyond that in both directions the path was open. I’m not sure what all the work taking place was about, but in part it was to provide a new section of the path, and to put in new breakwaters. Some time later of course there will be new riverside flats here, but for the moment these were being built closer to Greenwich.
One fairly recent addition to the path was the Greenwich meridian marker at the bottom centre of this picture, the line going along in the gap between two metal beams and pointing north across the river.
And a little further to the east is the sculpture A Slice of Reality by Richard Wilson. In the following year this was to become part of London’s first public art walk, The Line. It is a 30ft slice of the former sand dredger Arco Trent – Google’s AI gets it badly wrong by describing it as “an eighth-scale replica“. As the name suggests it is a slice of the actual ship.
As I turned back and walked towards Greenwich there were some dramatic skies and lighting, but also some slightly boring road walking where the path was diverted away from the river.
Soon I was able to return to the riverside path and walk through the surreal landscape of an aggregate wharf.
The final section of the walk on my way into Greenwich had been targeted by guerilla knitters.
I was getting short of time, and could only stop to make one panorama although the weather was perfect for it.
This view shows the riverside path at left going south at the left and north at the right – a view of over 180 degrees. The shoreline here highly curved was in reality straight. I think the image digitally combines half a dozen overlapping frames.
By then I was having to hurry to catch the train back into central London – and the light was falling.
Stop Western Intervention in Syria & Mali – Downing St
This protest had been called by Stop the War on the 10th anniversary of the march by 2 million against the Iraq war in 2003, the largest protest march ever seen in the UK (and with many others around the world also marching.)
On this occasion they were calling for a stop to Western intervention in Mali and Syria and against the possible attack on Iran but the numbers taking part were very much smaller, with only around a hundred turning up.
Among them were supporters of Syria’s President Assad and Stop the War had lost a great deal of support by opposing the help being given to groups against his regime, with many on the left calling for an end to his regime.
A Threatened Hospital, Riverside Walk, Syria & Mali – pictures from nine years ago on February 15th 2013.
Fight to Save Lewisham Hospital Continues
My work began at a lunchtime rally opposite Lewisham Hospital where the whole local community is fighting to save their hospital with both a legal challenge and further mass demonstrations including a ‘Born in Lewisham Hospital’ protest a few weeks later. Parts of the hospital across the main road are in the picture.
People were appalled by then Health Minister Jeremy Hunt’s decision to accept the proposals for closure, and to ignore the mass protests by local residents. Not only are the proposals medically unsound and will lead to patient deaths, but they also represent short-term thinking that will result in a huge waste of public funds.
Lewisham was a sucessful and financially sound hospital and had received sensible public investment to provide up to date services, and the services to be cut will have to be set up again at other hospitals. Closing Lewisham would not only incur high costs, but would waste the previous investment in its facilities.
Closure was only considered because of huge debts inherited when it was merged into a group which had earlier made a disastrous PFI (private finance initiative) agreement to build a new hospital a few miles away. Both the hospital group and Jeremy Hunt had been shown to be telling lies about the scope and cost of the replacement A&E and maternity facilities which would be needed if Lewisham were closed.
The well-attended protest was organised by the Save the Lewisham Hospital campaign which was raising funds for a legal challenge as well as a new poster and leaflet campaign and the forthcoming mass demonstration. But this was not just a campaign for Lewisham, but one that is vital for the whole of the NHS. Behind the speakers was a banner for the South-East London ‘Save Our Local NHS Hospitals’ campaign quoting Nye Bevan: ‘The NHS will last as long as there are folk left with the faith to fight for it.‘ They certainly had the faith in Lewisham.
I had some time to spare between protests and it was a nice day, around 10 degrees warmer than we’d been having and sunny, so I decided to take a bus to North Greenwich and walk along the Thames Path, having heard that parts of it had re-opened. The weather changed a little and there were some dramatic skies.
There is still a section of the walk that is closed, a giant building site where Delta Wharf once was up to Drawdock Road, but on each side of this the walk is open. although the council sign on the footpath leading from Tunnel Avenue still indicates it is closed. At the river the path north is blocked, but you can walk south to Greenwich.
A panorama – the same path in opposite directions at both sides
At first the walk goes alongside a giant manmade landscape of sand and gravel, like some alien planet – and behind the conical hills the Dome and the gas holder, with occasional lighting towers and cranes add to the scene. Most of this is behind tall fences, but fortunately these have gaps between the posts allowing you to see and photograph. Years ago the path here went through a working container dock, the Victoria Deep Water Terminal, with yellow lines marking the route, though occasionally it was blocked by crane operations, and we waited rather than have heavy containers overhead. There are a couple of my pictures of this and others from the riverside path in the 1980s on my London’s Industrial Heritage site.
Beyond there the riverside path seems rather empty, with many structures having dissappeared, including the huge concrete silo I photographed. But something new has appeared, ‘guerilla knitting’ on some of the trees and posts along the path.
It was the 10th anniversary of the march by 2 million against the Iraq war, Stop the War organised a small protest at Downing St calling for a stop to Western intervention in Mali and Syria and against the possible attack on Iran.
Many on the left feel that the failure of that huge protest to actually prevent the UK taking part in the invasion of Iraq showed a failure in the leadership of Stop The War to make any quick and efffective action to follow it up. Stop The War have also failed to convince the public at large with their more recent campaigns against intervention in Libya and now against the support being given to the Free Syrians and the Mali government. As the upper picture shows there were some supporters of the Assad regime, from a small left group, the Communist Party of Great Britain (Marxist-Leninist), taking part in the protest. Almost certainly the great majority of supporters of Stop The War while against UK military intervention would like to see more support being given in other ways to the Syrian rebels.
