Boris Bike stand maps ignoring the River Thames

The Boris Bikes are coming to the Isle of Dogs and in doing so, showing up the fallacy of using walking/cycling distance indicators that ignore the Thames.

Free tours of a Royal Navy Destroyer this weekend

A press release from the Royal Navy that is worth highlighting – as the Royal Navy’s Type 42 destroyer, HMS Liverpool is in London for a few days – and the public will be let on board to have a…

Updated photos of the Canary Wharf Crossrail Station

Although I did once go down underground into the station, here are a few photos I took over the weekend of the visible part of the building works, with reasonably close comparisons with previous photos I took. Difficult to get…

The ARC Gloria arrives in London

A few days later than

Tall Sailing Ship Visiting London – Free Tours

Fans of tall sailing ships may be interested to learn that the ARC Gloria, a training ship of the Colombian Navy will be in London from this weekend and there will be free tours of the ship for us Londoners…

West India Lock Opening

On the opposite side of the Isle of Dogs from where I live is a large blue bascule style bridge (map link) that carries road traffic over the lock admitting river based traffic into South Dock. One of the busier…

German Cruise ship tests London 2012 preparations

The German Olympic Committee wanted somewhere impressive and suitably German to use as a base during next years Olympics, so a test has been carried out to see if the cruise ship MS Deutschland could be moored in London Docklands.

30th Anniversary of the Docklands Development Corporation

Today (2nd July) marks the 30th anniversary of the formation of the LDDC - formally, the London Docklands Development Corporation, the latest in a series of attempts to do something with the abandoned wasteland of the former London Docks which had fallen on hard times since the early 1970s.

Riverside path reopens at Canary Wharf

One of the pleasures of living in the docklands area is the ability to walk along the riverside - although the council required private housing to provide a river path which is nice, but declined to make the same requirement for its own housing, which is less nice.

Photos from inside the Elizabeth line station at Canary Wharf

To mark the second year of works at the Crossrail Station in Canary Wharf,a notable Minister of the Crown , and your less notable correspondent got to go down into what is still very much a building site to have a look around.

HMS Ark Royal’s Battle Ensign (not) on display in Docklands

Just up the road from where I live is St Anne’s Limehouse, a Hawksmoor Anglican Church that was consecrated in 1730, one of the twelve churches built through the 1711 Act of Parliament. The Church is significant for several reasons,…

Views of London from a “hidden hill” in Rotherhithe

The areas around Rotherhithe and Surrey Quays were once a series of docks that were slowly filled in and lost in the 1970s and early 1980s. As befits an area that was originally a marsh, and then an industrial hub,…

15 years since the Docklands bombing

A fraction after 7pm on the 9th February 1996, the IRA ended their 17-month ceasefire with a huge explosion that ripped through the South Quays area of London's Docklands.

Going on board the Royal Navy Frigate, HMS St Albans

As I got slightly excited about earlier this week, the public are being allowed to go on board HMS St Albans for a look around the ship today. Guided tours for residents of its namesake, St Albans are taking place…

The Isle of Dogs Declares Independence from the UK

Following on from the rather dubious Mayoral election yesterday in Tower Hamlets, some people living on the Isle of Dogs (well, probably just me) might be wondering if we can be cut free from the rest of the Borough and…

Climbing up the Limehouse Accumulator Tower

If you use the Docklands Light Railway, you might have noticed a rather strange octagonal tower near Limehouse that seems to be sitting in an abandoned patch of waste-land. This tower, built in 1869 conceals a hydraulic accumulator that was…

Four NATO warships in Docklands

My route to the shopping centre can sometimes take me over the bridge at West India Docks, and occasionally the scenery is added to by the presence of a visiting ship or two. This weekend, there are in fact four…

Docklands in the Snow

Over the years since I moved into the docklands area, I have listened to people denigrating the area. Too often I am told the area lacks a “soul”, that it is full of glass and steel towers with no character…

Bird’s Eye View of the London Docks in 1845

Picked up another issue of the Illustrated London News to bolster my collection – and this one had a few drawings of the London Docks including a quite famous picture of the docks shortly after the completion of the new…

DLR Launches Photography Contest

I am writing about this not because I think the contest is noteworthy due to wondrous prizes, but for the sheer irony of the issues it raises. Over the years I have lived in the docklands area, I have on…

On board Greenpeace’s Rainbow Warrior

A rather unique opportunity presents itself this weekend, and that is the chance to visit one of the more famous ships in the world - Greenpeace's Rainbow Warrior. No, not the one the French sank, the other one.

The DLR’s Brief History of The Docklands

Somehow missed this, but the DLR has published A Brief History of Time the Docklands as a station by station guide. The booklet, some 28 pages long gives 2-3 paragraphs to the history of the area which each station is…

No to the Rotherhithe-Canary Wharf Bridge

A lobby group has been pushing for a pedestrian bridge to be built linking Canary Wharf with Rotherhithe – a route currently serviced by either a ferry service or (via a short walk) the Jubilee Line. It is being reported,…

Foggy London

It’s just gone incredibly foggy where I live in Docklands, and as tempted as I am to go out and take photos of fog in the evening, I am stuck indoors waiting for an email to authorise some work to…