Bike Serviced - Old Ford Locks 19 - Save the Ducks!

I've been a little out-of-action this week, because my beloved electric bike was away for servicing.

In the meantime, I popped in at the refurbishment of Old Ford Locks 19's shelter and sanitary station and discussed how things would be changing there in the future.

The physical changes to the sanitary station will be fairly dramatic:

• The chemical toilet disposal point (I may as well just give in and call it the 'Elsan') will be moving outside to the downstream end of the building where it will be rebuilt in a similar construction to the one at Old Ford 8 on the Regents Canal.
• The accessible toilet will have a new accessible entryway on the outside (with access by BWB key most likely, although I'd like to make a case for a NKS key entry too.)
• The current toilet will likely be kept for use by volunteers, and the old Elsan and the connecting passageway used to store volunteer materials. I'd make a case for making this a major store for volunteer uniform, signage and tools.
• The stable area will become a 'Welcome Station' - a shelter for volunteers including volunteer lock-keepers for Old Ford 19 and Carpenters Road Locks. There'll likely be some displays and material for visitors here too. 
• The water points will move upstream, away from the lock buildings. This may be a tricky bit of construction though, so the old points may stay for a while longer.

That's my understanding of CRT's current plans anyway.

Evening sun over Battlebridge basin entrance.

I also attended the London Waterway Forum, where the Trust presented a fair amount of information on what's been going on around the system. My two key take-aways were the huge numbers of hours volunteers are contributing to the Trust (over 500,000 volunteer hours last year) and the worrying deficiencies in the water supply for London's canals this season. If great care isn't taken over conserving water through the Regent's Canal we are likely to see more empty pounds and closures of locks through the summer. That's going to make many people unhappy.

There was also news of the opening of the Olympic Park waterways:

• The stadium loop should open in June/July. This will allow boats to pass around the loop, but with no mooring or stopping on the Bow Back waters (St. Thomas Creek, City Mill River and the Old River Lea.)
• Waterworks River will open for bookable navigation (in the same way as the Three Mills Wall River is bookable) when Carpenters Road Lock opens in August. Again, there'll be no extra moorings on these waters.
• The stretch of the Lee Navigation alongside Sweet Water, between White Post Lane Bridge and Monier Road Footbridge will gain mooring rings and move from being No Mooring to being a short-term visitor mooring - most likely with some bookable moorings for those wanting to visit the Olympic Park.

Healthy Swan and Duck food, and the Trust's duck food bag.

Today I reclaimed my much-refurbished bike and took it to Broadway Market Steps, Victoria Park, and Old Ford Lock 8 for a Share-the-Space and Save-the-Ducks event.

RB, DM, PW, RE and myself picked litter between Broadway Market and Old Ford Lock and also handed out free, healthy duck food (corn and mealworms), maplets and Share the Space postcards. RB had the bright idea of passing a large number of the Trust's custom printed paper bags for duck food to the duck food vendors at the park, and they received them happily (and wanted more.)

I spent a good while at the locks, chatting with the volunteer lock keepers and passing out many, many more maplets and postcards.

This was a great event, and despite a drip or two of drizzle, very successful.

4 hours.