Poplar Dock

Poplar Dock is a small dock in east London. It connects to the Blackwall Basin of the West India Docks and, although independent of this system, has never had a direct connection to the Thames.

Poplar dock was designed and built as a railway dock, in the days before any of London's enclosed dock systems were connected to the railway network. The dock was built by the East & West India Docks and Birmingham Junction Railway Company (later the North London Railway Company) and connected to the company's goods yard at Chalk Farm. It was alone among the docks to remain outside the control of the Port of London Authority in 1909, andremained in the ownership of British Rail until closure in 1981.

Because of its lack of a direct connection to the river, its operators needed the agreement of the owners of the West India Docks for uses which did not compete directly with their interests. In its early years the dock was used mainly to import 'sea-coal' from the Northeast of England.. ['Poplar Dock: Historical development', Survey of London: volumes 43 and 44: Poplar, Blackwall and Isle of Dogs (1994), pp. 336-341. URL: http://www.british-history.ac.uk/report.aspx?compid=46502. Date accessed: 22 October 2007.]

Much of the dock survives today as a mooring connected to Blackwall Basin.

ee also

* Blackwall Yard, a little to the east, which confusingly also had a small railway dock known as Poplar Dock.

References