On my round trip through Greenwich and Woolwich the other day, coming back from Beckton, I noticed a new set of paintings – street art, whatever you want to call it – at the bridge where the Greenway crosses the District Line between West Ham and Plaistow. It's a place I've shown before. I've never seen anyone at work there, but whoever they are I like what they do. What tends to happen is that once some new stuff's been put up, it attracts graffiti over the following weeks and months and gets to look more and more of a mess, until a new set appears, and the whole process starts again. It's good to see it when it's fresh. With that in mind, and on another sunny day, I set out…
My route through Clissold Park is blocked:
Never mind: an alternative route is quickly improvised, and I'm off through Stoke Newington and Clapton to the Lea Bridge Road, where the river dredging - "to improve the quality of the water" - continues:
Past all the work round the Olympic site (which I keep showing – but it's so busy I can't resist taking more pictures):
Across the High Street at Stratford, back onto the Greenway, and over the Channelsea River at Mill Meads. Tide's out:
That's the new Abbey Mills Pumping Station in the centre, which has replaced the old Joseph Bazalgette "cathedral of sewage" just to the north. The Greenway runs along the top of the Northern Outfall Sewer. You can just make out the Docklands towers in the distance, below:
And on to the bridge past West Ham:
That way on to Beckton:
I'm heading back the other way.
Mick Hartley 
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