please empty your brain below
Informative couple of articles about Sivertown parks, thanks. I have been meaning to go to the Thames barrier park for some time but never found it, having read your article I now know where it is. Sorry the fountains are not working, as to see them was one of the reasons I wanted to go there. Looks like a trip I shall be making next Saturday.(Might as well go when the caffeine and muffin pavilion is open!)
Pity the North London Line does not go there anymore.
Some interesting links in the article.

John | 19.02.08 - 7:52 a.m. | #

That little park always seems to be empty.

I suspect it was orignally meant to be for the Lyle's workers rather than the Tate and Lyle combined workforce...I think the companies combined round about that time, though in those days what is now the smallish (Tate &) Lyle's Golden Syrup factory was I think much larger than what is now the much larger Tate and Lyle sugar plant just down the road.

NiC | Homepage | 19.02.08 - 8:47 a.m. | #

L and I went out to Silvertown last September, especially to visit the Thames Barrier Park (I'd remembered an old post of yours about it, I think). It was a bit cold and windswept that day but the park was impressive nonetheless.

Dave | 19.02.08 - 9:23 a.m. | #

it's a beautiful park, but it's also well worth crossing the river to check out the thames barrier visitor centre whilst you're there, an informative exhibition including a classic early 80s video documentary of the making of the barrier!

Helen | 19.02.08 - 12:23 p.m. | #

I remember the Harland & Wolff yard on the bend of Manor Way, used to be an industrial rail line crossing the road at that point too which used to fascinate me. Then the were the forest of cranes visible from Newham Way and a concrete rail bridge over the northern end of Manor Way, plus the remains of Manor Way station.

Bowroad | 19.02.08 - 1:53 p.m. | #

Yes, we found Lyle Park by accident,thanks to a coloured A-Z (enticing green sliver on the map) and have been to Barrier Park several times: a great place completely unknown to all the yummy mummies stuck in their limited Clissold Park groove.And so easy by DLR. I think that the fountain's working parts were stolen, as have been recently a lot of the railings round Clapton Square .
Brilliant piece,DG, and thanks for fascinating Silvertown links.

felix | 19.02.08 - 7:17 p.m. | #

I live in Leeds but Thames Barrier Park is my favourite London park. I shall have to go and investigate Lyle Park next time I'm in the area.

Mark | Homepage | 19.02.08 - 7:57 p.m. | #

I took the kids to play in the fountains at Barrier Park a couple of summers in a row. The planting is very special and I commend them on the way that the large area of meadow is uncut in the summer - beautiful and fun for the children to hide in and make dens.

The demise of the fountains really is a shame, it was the highlight of the place. Fromwhat I can tell some scrap metal scum simply ripped out the whole lot of metal work and there is no plan to replace it.

Big shame.

Chris | 19.02.08 - 8:32 p.m. | #

I love Lyle park - it seems to be a bit of a radio blackspot, so I could hide down there and not get bothered by anyone sending me a job.

Of course it might just be that there are only a few people who live around there, and so I'm not close to any 'calls'.

(Which is not the reason why they plonked a brand new ambulance station there - it's so they don't have to pay them inner London weighting...)

Tom Reynolds | Homepage | 19.02.08 - 10:46 p.m. | #

To paraphrase...

"Oh yes, this is a very fascinating blogpost, very interesting, very 'DG'. I rather like it."

It's another quality DG blogpost, and another intriguing but little-visited area of London I'll need to have a butcher's at.

London's parks are really rather splendid, aren't they?

Andrewh | 19.02.08 - 11:28 p.m. | #

Thames Barrier Park visitors may like to also visit its big brother, (also designed by Allain Provost), should they be in the Paris area. The (working) fountains there are on a grander scale than in London. Giant greenhouses, great landscaping + they have a big balloon to go up in to see over the city. A nice riverside stroll along the Left Bank will take you there.

drD | Homepage | 20.02.08 - 1:52 a.m. | #

Further to my comment from 19 February, I was darn souf today so paid a visit to Thames Barrier Park and Lyle Park (gotta love those rail replacement buses!).

Thames Barrier Park was bustling with people sunbathing, reading, playing with kites and trying to climb over the railings around where the water feature used to be.

Lyle Park just had an empty playground and a few lads playing football.

However, find of the day, close to West Silvertown DLR, was the memorial to the Silvertown Explosion. Dubbed London's biggest ever explosion, 73 people were killed when a munitions factory exploded in 1917.

Wikipedia [1] says the blast demolished a gasometer in Greenwich and blew out the windows of the Savoy Hotel.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/
Sil...rtown\\_explosion
[2] My photos: http://flickr.com/photos/ulleske...gs/minocowharf/

Mark | Homepage | 03.05.08 - 11:41 p.m. | #











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