This morning I went down to the Royal Albert Dock for a meeting at the London Borough of Newham’s new offices (which have recently come under fire), and I thought that I’d tell you a little about the area.
The Royal Albert Dock DLR station, which sits on the opposite side of the dock from London City Airport’s runway (as you can see from the photograph below), effectively only serves the needs of two organisations – the London Borough of Newham as I’ve just mentioned, and the London Regatta Centre which sits just on the edge of the water a short distance away right on the dockside. Surrounding these two buildings are acres and acres of grass and barren scrubland, with a few housing estates located some distance away towards the A13. The office building that now houses the council sat empty for nearly six years after its construction until they moved in, but from the layout of the surrounding roads my thinking is that there was an intention at one time to fill this area with low-rise commercial buildings. Given that it is only a few hundred yards from noisy take-offs and landings, other developers clearly thought better of the idea… it’s a very odd place indeed. One can only imagine what the local authority’s staff find to do during their lunch hour – planespotting perhaps?
About Pete Stean
