The Regent's Canal

Book excerpt: The Regent's Canal, the Limehouse Cut, the Hertford Union and the Lee Navigation collectively cut a swathe through north and east London. This 14 mile path, cycle and waterway is a journey full of intriguing contrasts: From the amateur sports fields of Regent's Park to London's new Olympic Park. From the studio where Hitchcock directed some of his early films to MTV in Camden Lock. From fine period housing to industrial wasteland, social housing and new canalside builds. From the pleasure boats chugging to Camden to the sleek Eurostars roaring off to Paris. The use of canals has changed dramatically over the past fifty years from one of industrial transportation to waterfront living and leisure activities. The canals in this book have undergone major phases of rebirth with new developments at King's Cross, Limehouse and the Olympic Park in Newham. Illustrator David Fathers offers a snapshot of how the canals were formed and how they appear today, in a series of arresting and information-packed pages following a course from Little Venice to the River Thames at Limehouse, and on to the Olympic Park.