Greenland Dock - Redevelopment

Redevelopment

The Surrey Docks remained derelict for over a decade, with much of the warehousing demolished and over 90% of the docks filled in. Greenland Dock, which now belonged to the local authority, escaped this fate and in 1981 was handed over to the London Docklands Development Corporation. During this period the Inner London Education Authority ran a Surrey Docks Watersports Centre on the dock from a series of portable cabins at the Redriff Road end of the dock. It was at this centre many young people who would not have been exposed to sailing or canoeing were trained.

A masterplan was produced that advocated evicting the remaining industrial occupiers of the quaysides and transforming the dock into a residential area. This went ahead in the late 1980s despite some controversy, with seven residential developments being constructed on the site of the former warehouse complexes (and named after them; hence Swedish Yard became Swedish Quay, Brunswick Yard became Brunswick Quay, Baltic Yard became Baltic Quay and so on). Today the area is dominated by luxury residential developments, such as the Greenland Passage development and the gated New Caledonian Wharf. Additionally, a new watersports centre was constructed on the site of the former entrance to the now infilled Grand Surrey Canal. This has maintained the dock as a popular site for sailing, windsurfing, canoeing and even Chinese Dragon Boat racing.

The dock itself is still substantially intact, other than its former entrances and exits, all but one of which have been filled in or blocked. It still has a working connection to South Dock, which is now a marina, and it has a small marina of its own at its eastern end. There are no traces of the former warehouses, although many of the old capstans and some of the hydraulic machines on the quayside have been preserved.

The alternative comedian Malcolm Hardee drowned in the dock in 2005 while rowing to his houseboat from the floating pub he owned, the Wibbley Wobbley, which is moored at the Thames end of Greenland Dock.