100 things: 100 photos - photo 30: mayfly

mayfly_78

100 things: 100 photos - photo 30

Apr 27, 2014 11:08

I have so many photos from the Docklands in London, you wouldn't believe. The main reason is that my final post-graduate dissertation was on the Docklands. So in 2004 and 2005, I spent simply ages walking all over the docklands and taking photos.

The docklands are a strange place. Most of them are very new, both the buildings and the urban areas. Only here and there, and mainly closer to the centre of the city, do you find older buildings, mainly re-purposed warehouses. Also in the docklands you see very clearly what urban designers call "The Red Line". On one side of the red line - the area delineated on the map to be regenerated - you have new, upmarket constructions aimed at well-to-do white collar workers and nicely designed public spaces. On the other side of the red line - the surrounding already existing areas - you have run-down, impoverished areas populated by the working class and the poor. No effort seems to have been made to provide any sort of link or dialogue between these neighbouring areas. But that is London.

But yes, you can easily walk along the banks of the Thames into the docklands on the pleasant pedestrian walkways and paths, through little parks and squares, and all you can see is the water and the nice new developments. You would never even realise what is hidden way behind them.

[More than a white box]

photos, london adventures, #100things