Over the Thames

You are now crossing the Thames at up to 90 metres above the water. From up here you can read the whole story of London's river in one sweep. Look west, up the river, to the cluster of towers. That is Canary Wharf, built on the old West India Docks. The name comes from a quay built in the 1930s for fruit shipped in from the Canary Islands. Where crates of bananas and tomatoes were once unloaded, some of the world's biggest banks now have their offices. In the early 1900s this was one of the busiest stretches of river on Earth, crowded with ships waiting for a berth. Then came the shipping container. The new ships were too big for the old docks, and one by one the docks closed, the Royal Docks last of all, in 1981. Thousands of dockers lost their work within a few years, and whole neighbourhoods lost their reason for being. Now look east, down the river. On a clear day you can pick out a row of shining steel hoods across the water. That is the Thames Barrier, completed in 1982. Its gates can be raised to hold back a surge tide from the North Sea, and it has been closed more than two hundred times to keep London dry.