King George V Dock

The King George V Dock is one of three docks in the Royal Docks of east London, now part of the redeveloped Docklands.

History

Begun in 1912 by the Port of London Authority, the King George V was the last of London's upstream enclosed docks to be built. After delay by the First World War, construction was completed in 1921. Although at 64 acres (26 hectares) of water it was smaller than the other royals, it had its own entrance from the Thames and could berth liners as large as the Mauretania. At its western end was a large graving dock (since filled) and machine shop used for ship repairs by Harland and Wolff. It closed to commercial traffic along with the other Royal Docks in the 1980s.

Today

The major feature of the dock today is London City Airport, whose single runway has been constructed the length of the north side of the dock. The western end of the dock has been filled in, and the airport terminal built on the filled area. The rest of the water area of the dock still exists, acting as a buffer zone between the airport runway and the surrounding area. The southern quayside has been cleared of dock buildings and is now largely utilised as car parking for the airport.

The dock gave its name to King George V station on the London City Airport branch of the Docklands Light Railway, which opened in December 2005.

References

* NELP/GLC 1983, "Dockland: an illustrated historical survey of life and work in east London",ISBN 0-7168-1611-3
* Weinreb & Hibbert (Eds) "The London Encyclopedia", Macmillan, ISBN 0-333-30024-6