Aim -to Identify Different Types Of Land Use That Have Undergone Change In The Lea Valley Essay, Research Paper

Aim -to identify different types of land

use that have undergone change in the Lea Valley. -to examine the

reasons why the land use has changed. ??

- to investigate the impact of change upon the local community. -to investigate the impact of change upon the environment.Introduction-

The Lea Valley History Ponders End

started out as a large hamlet in the parish of Enfield. The High Street was

built up from Red Lane (Lincoln Road) to just south of Farm Lane (Southbury

Road). Houses were dotted along South Street as far as Ponders End Mill and the

Lee Navigation. There was also a small settlement clustered around Scotland Green.

There was no road access across the river to Chingford. (It was not until the

early eighteen-seventies that Lea Valley Road was built, financed by public

subscription). A report by the

General Board of Health (1850) on sanitary conditions in Enfield reveals an

alarming state of affairs in Ponders End. Many of the older cottages were

grossly overcrowded and extremely insanitary. The worst affected areas were

South Street and Scotland Green. The whole area suffered from poor drainage.Housing

development began at a fairly early date. Alma Road was developed from 1855 and

Napier Road had been laid out by 1867. The Lincoln House Estate (Derby Road and

Lincoln Road) was built up from 1871. Durants Road was developed from 1888 and

Nags Head Road from 1890. By 1914 much of the area had been built up, but there

was still open country separating Ponders End from Enfield Highway to the north

and Edmonton to the south.For many years

the nearest church was at Enfield Town. Then in 1831 St James Church was built

at Enfield Highway. Ponders End did not get a church of its own until 1878 when

St Matthew’s Church was erected in South Street. The nonconformists, however,

took Ponders End rather more seriously. An Independent Chapel was built in the

High Street in 1768. (This is the direct ancestor of the present United Reformed

Church).The oldest

industrial site is the Ponders End Mill. The present mill buildings date from

the late 18th century. In 1809 Grout and Baylis’ crape factory was built in

South Street. This closed in 1894 and the factory was later taken over by

United Flexible Metal Tubing. A jute mill was opened beside the Lee Navigation

in 1865, lasting until 1882. The building was taken over by Ediswan in 1886 and

used for the manufacture of electric light bulbs and later radio valves. During

World War I, a huge munitions factory, the Ponders End Shell Works was built in

Wharf Road. The factory buildings were sold off after the war. Further

factories were built in the thirties alongside the newly-built Great Cambridge

Road.After World War

II much of the older part of Ponders End was in a rundown state. From the

fifties onwards there was much council redevelopment particularly in the South

Street and Alma Road areas. Today Ponders End is an uneasy mixture of old and

new: the Mill buildings survive in the shadow of the Alma Road tower blocks.The River Lea

or Lee runs from Luton in Bedfordshire to the River Thames in east London.

Evidence of Bronze and Iron Age settlements have been found along the length of

the river and the Romans built Ermine Street parallel to the Lee shortly after

they arrived in Britain around two thousand years ago.The waters of

the Lee powered many mills producing flour, gunpowder and also England’s first

paper mill in c1494. As early as 1424 parliament passed an act allowing works

to improve navigation, and the Lee was for centuries an important goods highway

into London.? Malt, flour, coal and

gunpowder were all transported in large quantities to the capital. During the

mid 1700’s the navigation was much improved with new cuts and locks.?? Even after the arrival of the railways,

imported timber was still transported along the Lee to yards and factories at

Walthamstow and Tottenham, while coal was also taken up river to power stations

at Hackney, Brimsdown and Rye House.?

The land surrounding the Lee near Stratford was ideally placed for

industries that London did not want right on it’s doorstep, such as

slaughterhouses or gas works, but did want products from. By all accounts it

was not hard to see (or smell) where the early bone china produced at Bow in

the 1700’s got it’s bones from! Many new industries later grew up around

Edmonton and Ponders End, including firms manufacturing the world’s first radio

valves and vacuum flasks.?? At Enfield

Lock, the Royal Small Arms Factory was the major supplier of arms for the

British Army for over a century, and the "Matchbox" toys of every

60’s schoolboy were made in factories on the Lee at Hackney. While there is

still industry in the Lee Valley, the nature of much of it has changed over the

past fifty years or so.?? Some of the

older traditional sites remain along the navigation, but many have been

replaced by smaller industrial estates bringing new light and service

industries to the region.As well as

manufacturing industry, the Lee Valley became one of the largest areas in the

country for horticulture.? By the 1930’s

almost half the glasshouses in England were here, growing a variety of fruit,

vegetables and flowers. The towns of Cheshunt and Broxbourne were by this time

almost surrounded by glasshouses.? This

was due to the quality of soil, good water supply, easy access to the markets

of London and the availability of seasonal labour from the capital.? Although greatly diminished, there are still

many glasshouses around Enfield and north of Waltham Abbey, growing not only

fruit and vegetables, but also plants and shrubs for the many garden centres

around London.? The extraction of good

quality gravel, deposited in the valley during the ice age, also became a major

activity, particularly between Waltham Cross and Ware Although there are still

some working sites,? most have now been

returned to nature, many as lakes used for fishing and water sports.?In 1967, an act of parliament established the

Lee Valley Regional Park Authority to develop the areas along the Lee, many of

them by now derelict,? for recreation

and wildlife. Today it is mainly pleasure boats and waterbirds that travel up

and down the river in place of the barges carrying grain or coal.? Compared to the

industrial and suburban southern half of the Lee, the river takes on a

different character north of Hertford, running through fields and countryside

past Hatfield House and the Hertfordshire towns of Wheathampstead and Harpenden.? Although not navigable here, the river has

always had an important role to play, providing power for the many small mills

that were constructed along it’s route, some of which are still standing today.?? It is possible to walk the entire length of

the river by following The Lea Valley Walk from Luton to the Thames.? official names

have been spelt Lee, e.g. Lee Conservancy Board (1868), Lee Valley Regional

Park (1967), etc. The first occurrence of Lea was probably on a map dated 1576,

and most maps since have continued to call the river the Lea, but Brimsdown is in

the London Borough of Enfield which is made up of a collection of small

communities, once scattered across the royal hunting grounds of Enfield Chase.? These area are still separate but within the

London Borough of Enfield and are merged into one large area on the northern

edge of London.? Enfield Lock, Enfield

Wash and Enfield Highway are all situated along side the Lee Navigation, to the

south of Waltham Cross together with the districts of Brimsdown and Ponders

End.In 1855 Enfield

Lock station (originally called Ordnance Factory) was opened.? This was followed in 1884 by Brimsdown

station.? The Southbury Loop line (1891)

gave the area another station, sited in Turkey Street. This was originally

known, somewhat misleadingly, as Forty Hill.??

However, this station lost its passenger service in 1909 as a direct

result of tramway competition.? The

Brimsdown Power Station opened in 1903. The cheap and plentiful electricity

supplies were to attract many other industries to the area.Brimsdown is

mainly an industrial area and Enfield town lies further west and is more like a

village, containing its own market square, and a parish church.? The New River also runs through Enfield

town. The town itself has grown far less attractive in recent years and has

become busier at the same time.? A

lottery grant of £1.8 million has been awarded to the area for cleaning,

restorations and safer pedestrian areas.The name

"Enfield" means an area of open land belonging to Eana.?? At the time of the Doomsday book it was

spelt Enefelde, and by Henry VIII’s reign had become a favourite hunting forest

for royalty.? This tradition continued

with James I who spent much of his time at nearby Theobolds Palace.Chingford is on

the western bank of the River Lea, on the valley slope which quickly rises by

250 feet here. The high ground gives panoramic views across two large

reservoirs to North London and an obelisk was built on Pole Hill in 1824 as a

marker for the former Greenwich Observatory.?Railway lines

of the Lea ValleyThe main Lea

Valley route was started as early as 1840 when the Northern & Eastern

Railway opened it’s line from Stratford to Broxbourne, continuing on to Harlow

the following year and Bishops Stortford in 1842, on a route that would

eventually reach Cambridge.? Initially

built to 5ft gauge, within a few years it was converted to the standard 4ft

8½in and taken over by the Eastern Counties Railway, whose line it joined at

Stratford.? A branch north of Broxbourne

to Hertford followed in 1843, to a station on the edge of the town, which was

replaced in 1888 by the present Hertford East.?? After another branch to Enfield Town in 1849 there was a gap of

some twenty years before the rest of the network that exists today started to

appear, due in part to the financial problems of the Great Eastern Railway

which had been formed in 1862 from among others the Eastern Counties.Initially

served by horse buses from Lea Bridge station on the 1840 built line,

Walthamstow got it’s own stations when a further branch was opened in 1870.

Three years later this was extended? to

Chingford, and linked back to the new GER line coming out of London via

Hackney. This new line also went north through Seven Sisters to join the

Enfield branch north of Edmonton.? A

second Edmonton Green station was built on the new line and the Enfield branch

was widened to double track north of the new junction and even merited the

building of a proper station at Enfield Town to replace the former mansion that

had until then been used as the station.?

The old Edmonton station became Edmonton Low Level and even received a

second platform at the turn of the century, as the original single track branch

continued to be served by workmen’s trains until 1939, and did not finally

close until the 1960’s.? In 1891 another

link was built, this time from Edmonton Green to Cheshunt, which became known

as the Churchbury (later Southbury) Loop.?

Despite new housing around Waltham Cross, the line was not successful,

due in part to the expansion of the competing tram network at the same time.

The line soon became goods only, but eventually delivered the promised

passenger traffic fifty years on, after electrification and the re-introduction

of passenger trains in 1960.?? During

the 50+ year gap, one line was used for local goods trains, the other as a

siding.?? Special passenger services

were run for workers during the first world war, and it was always useful as a

diversion when the main Lea Valley line was closed (this happened several times

after accidents, bad weather and when bombs damaged the line during the Second

World War).While the later

lines to Chingford and Enfield improved after the 1960’s, the oldest part of

the line did not.? The large marshalling

yards of Temple Mills have now gone and Lea Bridge station, which was on the

very first line in 1840, suffered a long and painfull decline until even the

few peak hour diesel trains from Stratford that stopped there in the 1970’s

were withdrawn.? The line still exists

for freight and has now been electrified!?

There is little left of the station, but one day it could return…… ?As well as the

lines in to and out of Liverpool Street,?

some parts of the Lea valley feature on other routes:Hertford and

Enfield are also served by trains to Kings Cross and Moorgate.? The Great Northern Railway’s line to Enfield

was extended during the early 1920’s, Hertford North station opening in 1924

(by which time it was the LNER).? Part

of the original Enfield Chase station has been preserved at the Whitewebbs

Museum of Transport.A line from

Welwyn to Hertford was opened in 1858 terminating at Cowbridge station, which

was next to McMullen’s brewery in the centre of the town.? The line became freight only when Hertford

North station opened, eventually closing in the mid 1960’s.? Approximately 2½ miles of the trackbed now forms

part of the Lea Valley Walk between Cole Green and the viaduct carrying the

Hertford North line.? The rest of the

line on into Hertford can still be traced, ending at new industrial units which

now occupy the Cowbridge site.? A short

spur also linked this route with the Liverpool Street line near Hertford East

station.The Midland

Railway built it’s Tottenham and Forest Gate line through Walthamstow and

Leyton in 1894.? The line still exists

today thanks to its importance as a freight route around London, rather than

due to the small number of passengers who use the non-electrified Barking to

Gospel Oak trains.???????????????????? PictureThe approach I intend

to take is a- fair and critical oneMy aims in approaching

this study are-to find out as much as I can and present it in a good way