1844.] 



THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECT'S JOURNAL. 



150 



We shall now close our remarks by giving some lengthened extracts 

 from the valuable Report of the Commissioners, and heartily wish to 

 see the undertaking brought through the present session of parlia- 

 ment, and that it may not be marred by the narrow prejudices of the 

 city authorities, who, as they did with railways, will attempt to throw 

 obstacles in the way to prevent the Commissioners carrying out the 

 plan, under the plea that it will interfere with the ttndoubted rights 

 and privileges of the citizens of London! 



The CoMMissioNEEs' Report. 



Upon a careful review of the many subjects of improvement for which 

 plans had already been before the puhiic, or were subsequently submitted to 

 us, we considered an embankment of the river Thames to have the first claim 

 to our attention. 



For a considerable period the condition of a large portion of the river in 

 its passage through the metropolis has been the subject of observation and 

 complaint ; and although measures have at different times been submitted to 

 Parliament, having its improvement for their object, yet nothing of a com- 

 prehensive nature has been effected. 



The causes of the great change which has taken place in the bed of the 

 river Thames, in that portion of its course which lies between London and 

 Westminster Bridges, may be shortly stated. Among the first, if not the 

 ^ very first, of these in recent times, may be considered the removal of Old 

 London Bridge — a measure, no doubt, ultimately beneficial to the interests 

 of the river as a whole, but prejudicial for a time to the navigation imme- 

 diately above it. 



The operation of this change upon the condition of the river, and especially 

 in the portions between the bridges, though great, and, as already observed, 

 no doubt the immediate cause of the present embarrassment experienced iu 

 the navigation, has been uniform in its effects, and consistent in its character. 

 It has produced, as was anticipated, a higher rise and lower fall of the tide 

 than heretofore, and is producing, as was also to be expected, a general, 

 though not uniform, lowering of the level of the river bed. 



While the first of these consequences, however, has been immediate and 

 manifest, the second, it is obvious, if left to the operation of natural causes, 

 must necessarily be the work of time; and hence, in the interval, the navi- 

 gation of the river must be difficult at certain states of the tide. 



The shoals and irregularities, however, which constitute the greater portion 

 of this difficulty, are, in the evidence before us, attributed to other causes. 

 i We are referred to a want of uniformity in the bends and curves of the river, 

 to the disproportion between the breadth and volume of its waters, and pro- 

 bably to the varying nature of the material forming its bed, as natural agents 

 in working out these results, and, as artificial causes, to projections and re- 

 cesses in the shores, irregular dredging, and other evils alleged to have arisen 

 from imperfect conservancy. 



The conservancy of the river Thames is a privilege and a trust vested in 

 the Corporation of London by very ancient charters, confirmed and renewed 

 at various periods. The exact extent of the rights and of the duties thereby 

 assigned to that body have been the subjects of much diversity of opinion, 

 and of dispute and controversy both in and out of Parliament, strongly show- 

 ing the necessity for some legal decision, or legislative adjustment, upon a 

 matter of so much practical importance. Upon these points, however, it 

 does not appear to us that it is within tlie province of this Commission to 

 express an opinion ; we therefore conceive that we shall sufficiently discharge 

 our duty under this head, by soliciting the attention of your Majesty to the 

 . information furnished on this subject (extracts of which are annexed to this 

 Report) by the Commissioners on Municipal Corporations, by the Committee 

 of Parliament on the port of London, and by the City of London Navigation 

 Committee. 



Under the authority of the Corporation of London, and, on some occasions, 

 under special authorities obtained from Parliament, the river has been exten- 

 sively, though not systematically, embanked, and its water-way irregularly 

 contracted, as will be seen by a plan, annexed to this Report, of that portion of 

 the river which flows immediately through the centre of the metropolis. 



Other embankments we find are in progress at the present time, under 

 licenses granted by the Corporation, of which embankments plans are also 

 appended. 



The effect of these partial and occasional embankment has been from 

 time to time to alter the currents of the river, and to impair its navigable 

 channel. 



The embankments constructed under the authority of Parliament are few. 

 The first of these was projected by Sir Christopher Wren immediately after 

 the Fire of London. The object of this embankment was " to make a com- 

 modious quay on the whole bank of tlie river from Blackfriars to the Tower:" 

 and under the authority of the Act of Charles II. for rebuilding the city, and 

 a subsequent Act of the same reign, it was partially carried into effect. 



Under the first of these Acts, no house, outhouse, or other building what- 

 soever, was to be erected from Tower Wharf to Temple Stairs, within 40 feet 

 of the river, cranes and sheds for present use only excepted. 



Although few traces of such a way are at present to be found, yet a portion 

 of it from the Tower to Castle Baynard was actually executed. Encroach- 

 ments, however, were subsequently made upon it from time to time, and in 

 the year 1821, " notwithstanding a very decided opposition to the measure 

 in both Houses of Parliament, on the part of the Corporatioa of London, 



and the inhabitants of Upper Thames Street and its vicinity," the Act in 

 question was repealed. 



No further plan for regulating or improving the banks of the river was 

 entertained till the year 17G7, wlien a measure was submitted to the Cor- 

 poration of London for raising i;.'!()0,0(JO for the completion of Blackfriars 

 Bridge by embanking the north side of the river between Paul's Wharf and 

 Milford Lane, upon a line extending about half a mile in length. Arrange- 

 ments were subsequently entered into with the Societies of the Middle and 

 Inner Temple, and other parties, by which this embankment ultimately in- 

 cluded the frontage of the Temple Gardens. 



The terms in which this proposal was submitted to the Corporation would 

 apply with very little variation to many parts of the river at the present day; 

 and considering that a century at least had then elapsed since any measure 

 has been attempted for the " regulation and improvement" of its shores, and 

 that another century has very nearly arrived at its completion, the statement 

 is not undeserving of attention. "Tlie wharfs," it is observed, "within those 

 limits, by their different and very unequal encroachments, not only form an 

 irregular and disagreeable outline, hut afford the owners of some an undue 

 preference and advantage over others ; at the same time that the reflected 

 set of the tides, both ebb and flood, throws the force of tlie stream upon the 

 Surrey shore, opposite to Blackfriars, and, of consequence, slackens the cur- 

 rent on the London side ; this, together with the large sewers that empty 

 themselves in the neighbourhood, occasions a constant accumulation of sand, 

 mud, and rubbish, which not only destroys great part of the navigation at 

 low water, but renders the wharfs inaccessible hy the loaded craft even at 

 high water, unless at spring tides ; the mud and filth thus accumulated, not- 

 withstanding the frequent expense the wharfingers are at to clear it away, is, 

 when not covered with water, extremely offensive, and in summer time often 

 dangerous to the health of the neighbouring inhahifants." The Corporation 

 of London, it is presumed, acquiesced in the correctness of these statements, 

 inasmuch as they adopted the plan ; and powers were subsequently given by 

 Parliament for carrying it into efli'ect. 



The next embankment of importance took place at Durham Yard and the 

 places adjacent, now known as the site of the Adelphi Terrace, and tlie 

 buildings connected therewith. In the years 1768, 1769, and 1770, Messrs. 

 Adam and other parties applied to the Corporation of London for their con- 

 sent to this embankment, but without effect. The Court of Common Council 

 not concurring, the parties applied to Parliament for an Act enabling them 

 to effect a large em'iankraent in that vicinity, not in the lines originally pro- 

 posed, which Act was subsequently obtained, notwithstanding the most de- 

 cided opposition on the part of the Corporation in every stage of the bill, 

 and notwithstanding that the clauses subjecting the ground to be gained from 

 the river to the acknowledgment originally offerred to the Corporation were 

 not inserted in the Act, 



Within a comparatively recent period further embankments, upon a scale of 

 considerable magnitude, have been efl'ected in the same portion of the river. 

 We refer especially to the embankment which forms a part of the present site 

 of Hungerford Market, and which was sanctioned by the Legislature in con- 

 nexion with that measure; and to the projection devised for the enlargement 

 and rebuilding of the Palace at Westminster for the accommodation of the 

 new Houses of Parliament. 



'• During the last 50 years," it appears, " numerous grants have been made, 

 under the sanction of the Corporation, for embankments in various parts of the 

 Thames, throughout the jurisdiction of the city of London, by which the 

 general line of the river, to a certain extent," is alleged to have " been re- 

 gulated and improved. It was not, however, until within the last 15 years, 

 and under an order of the Common Council, tliat the balance of moneys re- 

 ceived on this account, and for other accommodations on the river, after 

 deducting the expenses applicable thereto, were brought in aid of the con- 

 servancy. 



The insufficiency of the funds strictly applicable to the purposes of the 

 conservancy appears to have long formed a subject of complaint on the part 

 of the Corporation, and we presume that to this, among other causes, is to 

 be attributed the fact, that as far back as there is any evidence of the defec- 

 tive condition of the river, previously to the year 1840, there is no trace of 

 any measure for a general and systematic improvement of the navigation, or 

 regulation of its banks, having originated with that body. 



Of the attempts made in Parliament to apply a partial remedy to this state 

 of things, mention will be made hereafter. They failed, as it appears to the 

 Commission, from causes which need not any longer operate : — in the first 

 instance (in 1825), under an apprehension that the removal of Old London 

 Bridge was too recent to admit of any accurate opinion being formed as to 

 its effects ; in the second (in 1840), from the indefinite character of the mea- 

 sures proposed, and from the opposition of the wharfingers, and others in 

 trade, to the plan upon which those measures were to have been founded. 



The Report then proceeds make some observations on the schemes pro- 

 posed by Sir Frederic Trench in July, 1841, and by Mr. John Martin, both 

 schemes the Commissioners appear to consider impracticable. 



The plans to which the attention of the Commissioners has been directed 

 as appearing to exhibit in their details the best mode of effecting an embank* 

 ment of the Thames, were three in number, viz. : 

 A plan prepared by Mr. Walker (A). 



A plan prepared by Mr. Page the acting engineer of the Thames Tunnel 

 (B); and 

 A plan founded upon the suggestions of a member of the Commission (C), 

 These will be occasionally referred to as plans (A) (B) (C) respectively. 



