The Thames Path by Leigh Hatts

Those living in the London ITV region will have been able to enjoy Peter Ackroyd’s 30 minute Thames programme this evening.

This first episode visited the source near Cirencester and claimed that the Rhine was once part of the Thames.

Most interesting was an interview with the owners of Rose Isle just downstream of Oxford. They plan on never leaving.

Also featured was nearby nearby Iffley Church. Peter Ackroyd is good on churches and their relationship with the water.  

Ackroyd on television, as in his Thames book, deals in themes so there are plenty of shots of the towpath up and down the river. 

There are four programmes and next Friday the theme will be art. 

The Sky Arts channel will show the series next month starting at 8.30pm on 4 September.

Those wishing to cross the Thames at Hambelden on weekdays during August and much of September may be delayed for about 15 minutes on weekdays. This is due to repairs being carried out on the weir.

See page 113.

Henley Management College, founded in 1946 and one of the top-ranked business schools in the world, is to be known as Henley Business School from this academic year.

This is the result of a merger with upstream Reading University. The faculty will consist of the Schools of Management, Economics, Real Estate and Planning and the International Capital Markets Association Centre.

Henley has for some time been the world’s third largest supplier of MBA education. 

The Henley Business School’s riverside building is at Hambleden just upstream of Henley-on-Thames. The house was bult in 1853 and known as Greenlands when occupied by the family of WH Smith.

See page 113.

Oxfordshire County Council reports today that work on improving the towpath upstream of Wallingford Bridge has been completed.

The path, alongside the castle’s meadows known as Queen’s Arbour and Castle Medow, was often slippery and wet weather halted work four times since last autumn. 

Councillor Roger Belson, Oxfordshire County Council’s Cabinet Member for Sustainable Development, said: “I’m delighted to say the work has now been completed and that local people will be able to use this stretch of the towpath whatever the weather.

Work started on 1 July and cost £11,000.

A range of agencies contributed to the county council project, including the Trust for Oxfordshire’s Environment, the Environment Agency, South Oxfordshire District Council and tenants who granted access to the site across their land.

See page 148.

The death of journalist John Whale has been followed by many interesting obituaries.

He had a very full life and saw many changes. For example he was an ITN political correspondent in the days when the reporter had to travel on the tube from Parliament to the central studio to deliver news of a Commons debate. Later, as editor of the Church Times, he saw the paper into a new office and managed the change to new technology.

He had a love of the Thames and he walked the Thames Path with his daughter-in-law. But this was not  a one off and he walked other routes around London.

In the guide I mention his custom, whilst still Church Times editor, of swimming once a year from Shillingford Wharf, near Dorchester in Oxfordshire, to nearby Shillingford Bridge. This is some distance and not a straight line. I don’t recommend anyone trying it today but Shillingford Wharf is a delightful spot to pause on the Thames Path for a picnic. 

His interest in the river was heightened when he lived at Barnes where he wrote a history of the church which had been consecrated in 1215 by Archbishop Stephen Langton on his way back from securing King John’s agreement to Magna Carta upstream at Runnymede. It was the destruction by fire of most of the church and the row about how to rebuild which led to John Whale and his wife Judy to move away and settled in central London. His view that a modern church should be built at the base of the surviving 16th-century tower prevailed.

See pages 52 and 150

This week there have been reports of flooding at Newbridge in Oxfordshire.

No more rain is forecast over the next fews days but as the water travels downstream from Newbridge flooding can be expected on other sections of the towpath.

The Environment Agency’s flood information number is 0845 988 1188 where you can hear recorded messages.

See page 182.

The Paynes & Borthwick Wharves redevelopment at Deptford has been halted.

The £60m project which would have included 275 flats and a diversion to the Thames Path has been delayed indefinately by developer Lane Castle.

Estate agent King Sturge launched the scheme last June at its Canary Wharf office backed by extensive advertising. The intended completion date was January 2009.

Planning permission was granted only after a long dispute with the Creekside Forum, representing local residents and conservationists, which objected to the demolition of Borthwick Wharf for an 18 storey tower. 

The current Thames Path upstream route follows Borthwick Street behind the wharves before turning inland into Watergate Street.

See page 19.

As many as 22 lock keepers’ cottages on the River Thames are to be sold or rented out. The lock keepers and their families must move out.

I am sorry to see this reported in The Times today. 

Marlow Lock’s cottage is one of ten to be sold and Cookham’s will be rented as the Environment Agency tries to reduce spending.

Eileen McKeever, the Environment Agency’s Thames manager, says: “We are aware that this is a very emotive issue for lock keepers and their families but we have been running the river in the same manner for 40 or 50 years and we need to modernise our working practices.”

What is wrong with the constant care and policing of the last 50 years? It works very well. Have the lock keepers been wasting their time? How much better railway stations were when they had a resident station master. There was no vandalism.

Lock keepers, who earn around £16,000 a year and are responsible for maintaining the water flow at weirs as well as looking after locks, will have to find a home elsewhere. The Chief Executive Baroness Young is paid £200,000 a year. 

55 year old Steve Drewett who has worked as a lock keeper for 23 years has been told that he and his family must leave his cottage at Sunbury Lock. 

Think about this as you walk the Thames Path this summer. Drop off at the Houses of Parliament and tell your MP what you think about the policy.

The arrival this weekend of the Olympic flame on the Thames Path at North Greenwich caused a brief closure of the route. Ellen McArthur carried the torch ashore for a handover before the ceremony outside the Dome.

The Dome, or O2 as it is now officially called, is one of the venues for the 2012 Olympics and will host the gymnastics, basketball and trampolining events. It will be interesting to see if the Thames Path can remain open during Games. It should be possible.Â

The Lea Valley Walk which runs alongside the Olympic Park is due to be open all the time.

Although much of the Thames towpath is a public footpath and part of a national trail it sometimes occurs to me that it would be difficult to tow a barge with a horse on the towpath.

The reason is that in some places trees now grow between the path and the water. 

Just prior to today’s Oxford & Cambridge Boat Race there has been tree felling on the towpath just upstream of Hammersmith Bridge. Residents in Chiswick across the water are not too happy at having their view changed and those living in Barnes residents claim that this summer there will not be the usual tunnel of trees shading them from the sun on the path.

Martin Garside of the Port of London Authority says: “The trees are slowly but surely destroying the stone wall, which is part of the flood defences. Ultimately the towpath would collapse and that’s just not an option.”

However, only every other tree has been removed from the stone wall this time although eventually all the trees will have to go. Maybe the work should have been done years ago.