VicLondon-Rotherhithe
Rotherhithe, Southwark
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Rotherhithe is the area along the river from the Pool snaking around Southwark Park down to the end of Limehouse Reach. The Pool is where the river widens and slows near London Bridge. East of this point the curve in the river as it rounds the Isle of Dogs and the tidal ow pressure from downstream cause the river to rise and fall with the tides. The water level can rise and fall as much as twenty-three feet, and the City has ooded several times across the course of history. This tidal change can happen very quickly, and it is not unknown for smaller boats to be swamped by a sudden breaking wave, or rolled by a sudden undertow. Those under human power can nd themselves pushed or pulled with the sudden ebb or ow, their trip lengthened as they ght the currents here.
This is an almost exclusively industrial area, with very little housing. Until the 1870s, much of Rotherhithe was dominated by a swamp. This was drained in the 1870s and by the 1880s; the area is dominated by the Surrey Commercial Docks. The area accesses the City and Wapping through the Thames Tunnel, a marvel of the 1850s that was constructed by the famed Mr. Brunel. The tunnel is paved with tarmac, and has lanes for traf c in and out of Wapping. There are sidewalks for pedestrians, but the tunnel is an area where foot travellers had best beware. There are many dark areas in the tunnel where miscreants can lie in wait for the unsuspecting. There is a regular police patrol through the tunnel, but muggings and murders still take place. There is now an underground rail that runs through the tunnel, these tracks separated from the roadbed by a series of columns that aid in supporting the tunnel roof.
When construction on the dockyards on the northern bank was nearing completion, it was already obvious that the Surrey docks were going to have to be expanded to handle the influx of trade that the imperial enterprise was bringing to the city. Starting with Lavender Pond, and the Commercial docks that paralleled the Surrey Canal, the yards were expanded over the space of ten years to include a series of new facilities like Canada and Albino Docks, which were connected to Quebec Pond, and through that to the canal. Greenland and East Country Docks completed this patchwork of harbours, and warehouses surround the waters. This area of the city is, like the Isle of Dogs, constantly busy and occupied. Police presence here is high, as are private guards, who patrol the region to stop the theft and vandalism that the workers and passers-through wreak on the buildings.
