Thames being made ready for Jubilee Pageant

Almost 10,000 feet of chain is being used to construct special moorings in Barn Elms Reach, between Putney Bridge and the Harrod’s Depository near Hammersmith Bridge.

The moorings sit on the part of the river that forms part of the course for the annual University Boat Race. As a result, work laying the moorings couldn’t start until this year’s race had taken place.

Other preparatory work the PLA is doing includes installing heavy duty moorings in central London for vessels joining the ‘Avenue of Sail’.

The PLA has also announced that a well known feature in the river, the island known as Oliver’s Ait, below Kew Bridge, has been given a £30,000 facelift to protect it from erosion. Tree roots had disturbed the stone work which protects the narrow upstream end of the 120m long, 10m wide wooded island from the force of the river.

Following tree management work, a PLA managed team worked daily on Oliver’s Ait for five weeks, repairing and replacing the stones of the so called upstream cut water, which faces the erosive force of two daily ebb tides which run in excess of four knots. The water levels in this stretch of the tidal Thames can rise and fall by as much as 6.5m.

Oliver’s Ait is named after Oliver Cromwell who, according to legend, made the Bull’s Head on the north bank of the Thames at Strand on the Green his temporary headquarters during the English Civil War of 1642-1651.