{"id":19351,"date":"2026-09-01T09:00:00","date_gmt":"2026-09-01T08:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/re-photo.co.uk\/?p=19351"},"modified":"2026-08-29T10:11:28","modified_gmt":"2026-08-29T09:11:28","slug":"cycling-the-colne-valley-2004","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/re-photo.co.uk\/?p=19351","title":{"rendered":"Cycling The Colne Valley – 2004"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Cycling The Colne Valley<\/strong>: The Colne Valley Regional Park<\/a> was founded in 1965 but its development has been rather frustrated over the years, with the M25 being built along much of it and the M4 and M40 passing through, not to mention the increasing development of Heathrow – and if it ever goes ahead the third runway will cut a huge swathe through it.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The park stretches from Rickmansworth in the north to Staines in the south, and my bike ride on September 1st 2004 was only in the southern half of it, from Staines to Harefield and back.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Cycling
Lock and bridge, Grand Union Canal, near Harefield, Middlesex.<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

Somewhere close to West Drayton was a finger post showing a bridleway – the Colne Valley Trail – to Staines. I rode and walked past it on various occasions; it led just a few yards to a fence and a firmly locked gate. More than 20 years later the trail has still not managed to reach Staines, though the map on the park site shows it now ending on the Colnbrook Bypass, so perhaps some progress has been made.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Cycling
Weirs; Grand Union canal is out of picture to the right<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

As my account in 2004 below suggests, it was in some ways a frustrating ride, but the Grand Union Canal always has some interest as I hope the photos show. And there are some good short rides and walks in the park as well as places worth a visit – including Harmondsworth with its Great Barn<\/a> – the village and others will be destroyed if Heathrow gets another runway and the barn may not survive being moved.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Here’s what I wrote in 2004.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n\n\n\n

On my bike<\/h4>\n\n\n\n

Staines – Harefield – Staines<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Cycling
Reflections on the Colne\/Grand Union canal<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n

September seems like the end of summer, but started with some of the best weather we’ve had this year, so I felt like a bike ride. I’m still waiting for the bridle path from Staines to West Drayton to open, so it started with the normal dusty trek up past the edge of the airport. A skeletal T5 (or are they building T6 or T7 as well) looms immense and threatening over the surrounding countryside, but there are no decent views past the fences and screening trees. I push on up to Harefield at speed before descending to the canal, only to find that I’ve picked the one bit of towpath that is actually closed for repair work.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"Cycling
New housing by Grand Union Canal, Harefield, Middlesex<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"Cycling
Office development on former industrial site next to Grand Union Canal, near Harefield<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"\/
Offices along Grand Union Canal, Uxbridge, Middlesex<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n\n\n\n
\"\"\/<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

So I take some other footpaths, and don’t so much get lost as overcome with uncertainty as one of these disappears in the middle of a gravel site.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\"\"\/<\/figure>\n\n\n\n

I give up and take to the main road, soon to discover it’s a mistake. Eventually I get back to the canal and cycle back along the towpath all the way back to West Drayton to curse again the barred bridle path and the busy traffic and bicycle hostile road engineering – now in the rush hour – past the airport.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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There are a few more pictures on My London Diary beginning here<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Flickr<\/a> – Facebook<\/a> – My London Diary<\/a> – Hull Photos<\/a> – Lea Valley<\/a> – Paris<\/a>
London’s Industrial Heritage<\/a> – London Photos<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

All photographs on this page are copyright \u00a9 Peter Marshall.
Contact me to buy prints or licence to reproduce.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Cycling The Colne Valley: The Colne Valley Regional Park was founded in 1965 but its development has been rather frustrated over the years, with the M25 being built along much of it and the M4 and M40 passing through, not to mention the increasing development of Heathrow – and if it ever goes ahead the … Continue reading Cycling The Colne Valley – 2004<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[13,3],"tags":[25332,25329,25330,25331,25328,1253,12561,2228,4435,21,25333,17,1343,2090,3727,83,1466,1464,2760,891,22808,18011,3169],"class_list":["post-19351","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-londonphotos","category-my-own-work","tag-bridleway","tag-colne-valley","tag-colne-valley-regional-park","tag-colne-valley-trail","tag-cycling-the-colne-valley","tag-grand-union-canal","tag-harefield","tag-heathrow","tag-heathrow-expansion","tag-housing","tag-lakes","tag-london","tag-london-photos","tag-m25","tag-offices","tag-peter-marshall","tag-river-colne","tag-staines","tag-third-runway","tag-towpath","tag-west-drayton","tag-woods","tag-works"],"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/re-photo.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19351","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/re-photo.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/re-photo.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/re-photo.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/re-photo.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=19351"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/re-photo.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19351\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":19352,"href":"http:\/\/re-photo.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/19351\/revisions\/19352"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/re-photo.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=19351"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/re-photo.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=19351"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/re-photo.co.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=19351"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}