Making history in Lea Valley
The Lea Valley, the valley of the River Lea (London’s second river) is a major tributary of the River Thames. It flows from its northern rural end in Hertfordshire, passing several towns (Luton, Hertford and Ware) into Greater London and south through the Lower Lea Valley (Tottenham Hale, Stratford, Bow and Leamouth) before Merging with the River Thames.
For centuries the river Lea provided transport and powered mills that were vital for local industries. From the mid-19th century this rural landscape of rivers, marshes and farmland was dramatically transformed by the creation of the reservoirs and increase in the industrialisation along the River Lea. The mills were replaced by factories, attracted by London’s growing demand for manufactured goods and easy access to coal and raw materials brought up the river from London Docklands.
A positive outcome of the decline of the valley’s industries in recent years has been to preserve and protect the area’s special waterside ecology. Remote and peaceful nature reserves are now a valley feature and, in several locations, redundant industrial features have been imaginatively incorporated into the surrounding landscape.
Domesday Book
1086

Growing London
1613

Public Health pioneers
1852

Coppermill
1859

The Reservoirs
1863

Cathedral of Sewage
1868

world firsts
1878

Victorian Enineering
1894

Powered Flight
1909

Lee Valley Regional Park
1967

London's 3rd Olympics
2012

Urban Wetland
2017
