Lock keepers and Lock keeping
Life as a lock keeper
By Linda Serck
It's an unsettling time for lock keepers along the Thames, with the Environment Agency considering selling off or leasing their river-side cottages in a cost-saving measure. What effect would an eviction have on the lock keepers and their family? It's a seemingly idyllic life for lock keepers and their family. Living in a picture postcard cottage nestled along the Thames. The view from your window is of the vast waters lapping gently against the banks. You can sit in your English country garden enjoying a coffee while soaking up the best of British weather. Cookham lock As a cost-saving measure, the Environment Agency are reviewing whether to move lock keepers out of their expensive homes in order to sell them off or lease them out. But what is life actually like for a lock keeper? Kim Henge from Cookham lock feels very strongly that her lock keeper husband Adam should stay put. "The surroundings are lovely but you have the general public going through on boats and they need assistance during the summer nearly every day. This is one reason we're here," she says.
"They need assistance during lock keeping hours between 9am and 7pm, but a lot of the time after 7pm they still need help. And that is essentially why a lock keeper stays on site, he is here to deal with anything after those hours. Marsh lock keeper's cottage during flooding "Although the Environment Agency don't think that we're needed to do that it's blatantly obvious that we are when we get called two or three times of an evening when somebody's in trouble."
A lock keeper's salary is around £17,000, which factors in their rent-free home. This for Tracy Hinton, whose partner Nigel O' Connor is lock keeper at Marsh lock in Henley-on-Thames, is a worry for the future. "You can't save for a rainy day," she says. "You wouldn't be able to have a mortgage and move on when the time comes, so lock keepers have to rely on housing. "When we leave here when my partner retires we need to make our own arrangements for accommodation." "Once upon a time I understand they used to help retired lock keepers and help house them but I don't think that's the case today. You're declared homeless and you get your notice." Cookham lock One of Kim's greatest concerns is that there is no system in place to replace what her husband does as a job. "Times might have to change," she admits, "but at the moment it's as it always was, there is nothing in place to take over from a lock keeper.
"There are no extra precautions, it's not automated, so there's a real need for them at the moment." "Maybe in years to come that might change but as it is at the moment every lock needs a lock keeper and it's essential that they keep them in place to do what they are here to do, which to me is river safety and flood defence." She adds: "We get called at 11pm at night and Adam will be up out on the weir in five minutes, and to me that's part of his job. It doesn't matter what time they ring. "If he didn't the water might get so low that the people are going to run aground or fish are going to die. Boating through Marsh lock in Henley-on-Thames."Or if there's too much water you've got to release it quickly to get it down the river to the sea which is where it's ultimately heading.
"It can take an hour or less for the river to change. It can change so fast you need immediate response." Tracy adds that her partner Nigel is also there in a policing capacity. "In the main everyone's happy jolly boaty people having a good time, but there are people on the river who haven't got a licence, they're just trying to scam it. "The lock keepers are there to try and keep everyone paying their licences and keeping the river safer for everyone to use."
It's an unsettling time for lock keepers along the Thames, with the Environment Agency considering selling off or leasing their river-side cottages in a cost-saving measure. What effect would an eviction have on the lock keepers and their family? It's a seemingly idyllic life for lock keepers and their family. Living in a picture postcard cottage nestled along the Thames. The view from your window is of the vast waters lapping gently against the banks. You can sit in your English country garden enjoying a coffee while soaking up the best of British weather. Cookham lock As a cost-saving measure, the Environment Agency are reviewing whether to move lock keepers out of their expensive homes in order to sell them off or lease them out. But what is life actually like for a lock keeper? Kim Henge from Cookham lock feels very strongly that her lock keeper husband Adam should stay put. "The surroundings are lovely but you have the general public going through on boats and they need assistance during the summer nearly every day. This is one reason we're here," she says.
"They need assistance during lock keeping hours between 9am and 7pm, but a lot of the time after 7pm they still need help. And that is essentially why a lock keeper stays on site, he is here to deal with anything after those hours. Marsh lock keeper's cottage during flooding "Although the Environment Agency don't think that we're needed to do that it's blatantly obvious that we are when we get called two or three times of an evening when somebody's in trouble."
A lock keeper's salary is around £17,000, which factors in their rent-free home. This for Tracy Hinton, whose partner Nigel O' Connor is lock keeper at Marsh lock in Henley-on-Thames, is a worry for the future. "You can't save for a rainy day," she says. "You wouldn't be able to have a mortgage and move on when the time comes, so lock keepers have to rely on housing. "When we leave here when my partner retires we need to make our own arrangements for accommodation." "Once upon a time I understand they used to help retired lock keepers and help house them but I don't think that's the case today. You're declared homeless and you get your notice." Cookham lock One of Kim's greatest concerns is that there is no system in place to replace what her husband does as a job. "Times might have to change," she admits, "but at the moment it's as it always was, there is nothing in place to take over from a lock keeper.
"There are no extra precautions, it's not automated, so there's a real need for them at the moment." "Maybe in years to come that might change but as it is at the moment every lock needs a lock keeper and it's essential that they keep them in place to do what they are here to do, which to me is river safety and flood defence." She adds: "We get called at 11pm at night and Adam will be up out on the weir in five minutes, and to me that's part of his job. It doesn't matter what time they ring. "If he didn't the water might get so low that the people are going to run aground or fish are going to die. Boating through Marsh lock in Henley-on-Thames."Or if there's too much water you've got to release it quickly to get it down the river to the sea which is where it's ultimately heading.
"It can take an hour or less for the river to change. It can change so fast you need immediate response." Tracy adds that her partner Nigel is also there in a policing capacity. "In the main everyone's happy jolly boaty people having a good time, but there are people on the river who haven't got a licence, they're just trying to scam it. "The lock keepers are there to try and keep everyone paying their licences and keeping the river safer for everyone to use."
Adam and Kim Benge look after the lock at Cookham and reside in Marsh cottage which is owned by the Environment Agency. There are turbulent times ahead as the Environment agency considers selling off their stock of similar cottages.
Article available at: http://www.bbc.co.uk/berkshire/content/articles/2008/08/14/lock_keepers_feature.shtml
Article available at: http://www.bbc.co.uk/berkshire/content/articles/2008/08/14/lock_keepers_feature.shtml
A working life: the lock keeper
A lock keeper's job involves more than opening locks, such as checking on wildlife – and even preparing for the Olympics
The contrast is startling. Emerging from the tube at Bromley-by-Bow in east London I navigate a graffitied subway before walking alongside the busy A12 while cars, lorries and buses hurtle past. But after a sudden left turn into Bow Locks the world is transformed into an oasis of calm, water rippling in the autumn sunshine, cyclists meandering along towpaths, and coots bobbing merrily on the surface of the canal. Lock keeper Annie Myers greets me wearing only a T-shirt under her life-jacket, while I am in a jumper and coat. Having worked on east London's canals for more than six years, she's made of sterner stuff than me. We descend into one of British Waterways' maintenance barges for a cup of tea to discuss health and safety issues. Walking down the steps forwards, I quickly learn, is a breach of the rules.
East London's waterways are now London's Olympic waterways, snaking around the area of the 2012 Games, currently a building site peppered with rising stadiums and housing. Part of Myers's job is to liaise with the Olympic Delivery Authority (ODA) to ensure that barges going to and from the area get through without delay.
In total, up to 1.75m tonnes of construction materials will be brought in by barge, taking up to 170,000 lorry journeys off local roads. "Each barge weighing 300 tonnes or more will keep nine construction lorries off the road," she marvels. "Isn't that great?"
Myers and her colleagues, including the soon-to-retire Mick, look after the "Bow Back Rivers", canals that stretch north of Bow Locks up to Old Ford Lock and south to Limehouse Basin. Some of her tasks include clearing the canals of invasive weeds, helping to ensure the survival of wildlife, and helping barges and narrowboats through the many locks in her region.
On the morning I arrive, pondweed has once again drifted menacingly back to the canal – no matter how often Myers and her colleagues remove the plant, it returns, often within hours, at the height of the weed season. We head out on the maintenance barge to get rid of it.
Advertisement"The weed season is difficult for us," she says, "because as fast as we can clear pondweed, pennywort and blanket weed, they come back. It can be a bit soul-destroying."
We go at the weed, which lies on the surface of the water like a toxic scum, with a rolling conveyer belt, which lifts the plant off the water, along rubber runners towards the back of the barge, where it drops off, ready to be dumped later.
Steering the boat while clearing weeds is tricky. "It's really hard to manoeuvre this while trying to get all of the weed, and especially hard if you're trying to talk at the same time," Myers says, looking at me with a grin. We track the pondweed most of the way north from Bow Lock to Old Ford, as the Olympic Stadium rises into view to our right.
London's canals were originally built to connect the great docks on the Thames with the industrial Midlands, though some parts of the Bow Back Rivers have been derelict since the second world war. Today, thanks to the Olympics, restoration is under way with funding for a major new lock and water control structure in Bow.
"The Olympics are going to rejuvenate this area," Myers says. "It's such a great thing. Already there is so much traffic coming and going from the building sites, and soon there will be tourists coming to look at the site and waterbuses taking spectators to and from the games. It's a massive opportunity for us."
The government has recently announced that British Waterways, the public corporation that cares for the 2,200-mile network of canals and rivers in England, Scotland and Wales, is to be turned into a new charitable body as part of the cull of the quangos.
Unions have criticised the decision, with Unison raising fears that a lack of funding could lead to the country's waterways falling into disrepair and maintenance work being left to volunteers if sufficient funding is not found to pay qualified engineers.
Myers doesn't see it that way. "It's great news for us," she says. "It means we should finally get more investment and hopefully more volunteers, and it will give local people the chance to really get involved with their canals."
The next day, I notice that Myers's view echoes that of the British Waterways chairman, Tony Hales, – her ultimate boss – who described the change in statues as "excellent".
Once we've fought and lost a losing battle with the pondweed, we spy some pennywort, a weed that sits underneath the water and requires us to go at it repeatedly, using the arm of the conveyer belt to detach it from reeds and scoop it up on to the belt. It often takes repeated attempts and can be frustrating. On the way back to Bow Locks, the areas cleared of pondweed are covered once again.
At the lock, Myers talks of other frustrations the job brings. "We get a bit of hassle from local youths," she says. "Individually they're great, but when they get together, a gang of them can be quite antisocial."
This seems an understatement when she points out the charred innards of her control room, which contain all the electrics to operate the tidal gates. We look at burnt controls and heat-warped windows, wondering why anyone would want to destroy something that not only brings pleasure to thousands but is an important part of the area's flood control.
"They've broken into here before, but never done anything as bad as this. The good thing is that they've been lying low ever since. I guess even they know they went a bit too far this time."
A different type of problem involves damage to the local wildlife. British Waterways employs an ecologist for the region, but Myers is often at the frontline, checking birds' nesting sites, the health of birds and animals, the quality of the water and watching for illegal fishing. Myers once found herself building holts to help the reintroduction of otters to the canal and seems pleased that mink still roam the banks.
But not every animal story has a happy ending. "We've had people killing swans here and have found carcasses that show the swans have been eaten – they are considered a delicacy in certain parts of the world," she says. Staff recently caught poachers, who had become stuck in the mud, with around 10 swans in a sack, still alive. "We rescued them and the swans."
Myers has also found evidence of illegal lines cast into the canal by poachers looking for eels and elvers, and has seen the aftermath of people throwing dustbins on top of coots' nests, damaging the floating nests as well as coot chicks and eggs. Flytipping is another concern.
At lunchtime Myers shows me how to operate the locks, which open for leisure and commercial boats. Bow Creek is tidal, flowing directly into the Thames, meaning she is often called out when there is a flood alert. "If the water level gets close to 7m we're in real trouble," she says. "But we've got the weir gates to help. Canals are a really useful way of helping London control flooding. They can be used to take water away from problem areas and out to sea."
In the afternoon we head south, along the straight Limehouse Cut, built in around 1766, arrowing for two miles from Bow Locks through the London borough of Tower Hamlets to Limehouse Basin, where it connects with the Hertford Union Canal, and on up to Birmingham and the north.
In its heyday, Limehouse Basin was a working dock, a place of intense activity as foreign cargoes were unloaded on to narrowboats and transported to the north. Today it is more of a marina, bursting with luxury cruisers and houseboats, towered over by expensive housing and waterside restaurants. Myers monitors how the cormorants are doing on a little island within the Basin, and we watch as they walk on water before taking flight.
She sees that a couple of floating nests used by the birds are falling into disrepair, and makes a note of it.
"It's going to be even nicer here during the next couple of years," she says. "They're building pontoons for more boats and for waterbuses to ferry Olympic spectators. We'll be busier, which is wonderful, but I hope the wildlife is looked after."
Back at Bow Locks, Myers explains that boats of any type must book 24 hours in advance to get through the tidal gates. There are no more scheduled for today, but she has plenty more booked in for the rest of the week.
"There's rarely a dull moment," she says, "because there's so much to do. People often think it's just working the locks, but there's so much more to the job than that." And she heads off once again to attack that pondweed.
Curriculum vitae Salary £13,000-£18,000 plus London allowance
Hours Core hours are 8am-4pm, and there is a rota between 4pm and 8am to cover those emergency callouts. Myers is on call roughly once every three weeks.
Work-life balance "When you're on call the job can impinge on your home life – you have to forget about going to the cinema or theatre – but I tend to balance it all quite happily. It helps that work is often home from home for me."
Best thing "Coming off a busy road into this wonderful, quiet environment. To be in the middle of the city, but in such a lovely, calm place."
Worst thing Bad winters, when you get iced in for five or six days. "It is frustrating and difficult to cut through the ice to allow vehicles to pass through."
East London's waterways are now London's Olympic waterways, snaking around the area of the 2012 Games, currently a building site peppered with rising stadiums and housing. Part of Myers's job is to liaise with the Olympic Delivery Authority (ODA) to ensure that barges going to and from the area get through without delay.
In total, up to 1.75m tonnes of construction materials will be brought in by barge, taking up to 170,000 lorry journeys off local roads. "Each barge weighing 300 tonnes or more will keep nine construction lorries off the road," she marvels. "Isn't that great?"
Myers and her colleagues, including the soon-to-retire Mick, look after the "Bow Back Rivers", canals that stretch north of Bow Locks up to Old Ford Lock and south to Limehouse Basin. Some of her tasks include clearing the canals of invasive weeds, helping to ensure the survival of wildlife, and helping barges and narrowboats through the many locks in her region.
On the morning I arrive, pondweed has once again drifted menacingly back to the canal – no matter how often Myers and her colleagues remove the plant, it returns, often within hours, at the height of the weed season. We head out on the maintenance barge to get rid of it.
Advertisement"The weed season is difficult for us," she says, "because as fast as we can clear pondweed, pennywort and blanket weed, they come back. It can be a bit soul-destroying."
We go at the weed, which lies on the surface of the water like a toxic scum, with a rolling conveyer belt, which lifts the plant off the water, along rubber runners towards the back of the barge, where it drops off, ready to be dumped later.
Steering the boat while clearing weeds is tricky. "It's really hard to manoeuvre this while trying to get all of the weed, and especially hard if you're trying to talk at the same time," Myers says, looking at me with a grin. We track the pondweed most of the way north from Bow Lock to Old Ford, as the Olympic Stadium rises into view to our right.
London's canals were originally built to connect the great docks on the Thames with the industrial Midlands, though some parts of the Bow Back Rivers have been derelict since the second world war. Today, thanks to the Olympics, restoration is under way with funding for a major new lock and water control structure in Bow.
"The Olympics are going to rejuvenate this area," Myers says. "It's such a great thing. Already there is so much traffic coming and going from the building sites, and soon there will be tourists coming to look at the site and waterbuses taking spectators to and from the games. It's a massive opportunity for us."
The government has recently announced that British Waterways, the public corporation that cares for the 2,200-mile network of canals and rivers in England, Scotland and Wales, is to be turned into a new charitable body as part of the cull of the quangos.
Unions have criticised the decision, with Unison raising fears that a lack of funding could lead to the country's waterways falling into disrepair and maintenance work being left to volunteers if sufficient funding is not found to pay qualified engineers.
Myers doesn't see it that way. "It's great news for us," she says. "It means we should finally get more investment and hopefully more volunteers, and it will give local people the chance to really get involved with their canals."
The next day, I notice that Myers's view echoes that of the British Waterways chairman, Tony Hales, – her ultimate boss – who described the change in statues as "excellent".
Once we've fought and lost a losing battle with the pondweed, we spy some pennywort, a weed that sits underneath the water and requires us to go at it repeatedly, using the arm of the conveyer belt to detach it from reeds and scoop it up on to the belt. It often takes repeated attempts and can be frustrating. On the way back to Bow Locks, the areas cleared of pondweed are covered once again.
At the lock, Myers talks of other frustrations the job brings. "We get a bit of hassle from local youths," she says. "Individually they're great, but when they get together, a gang of them can be quite antisocial."
This seems an understatement when she points out the charred innards of her control room, which contain all the electrics to operate the tidal gates. We look at burnt controls and heat-warped windows, wondering why anyone would want to destroy something that not only brings pleasure to thousands but is an important part of the area's flood control.
"They've broken into here before, but never done anything as bad as this. The good thing is that they've been lying low ever since. I guess even they know they went a bit too far this time."
A different type of problem involves damage to the local wildlife. British Waterways employs an ecologist for the region, but Myers is often at the frontline, checking birds' nesting sites, the health of birds and animals, the quality of the water and watching for illegal fishing. Myers once found herself building holts to help the reintroduction of otters to the canal and seems pleased that mink still roam the banks.
But not every animal story has a happy ending. "We've had people killing swans here and have found carcasses that show the swans have been eaten – they are considered a delicacy in certain parts of the world," she says. Staff recently caught poachers, who had become stuck in the mud, with around 10 swans in a sack, still alive. "We rescued them and the swans."
Myers has also found evidence of illegal lines cast into the canal by poachers looking for eels and elvers, and has seen the aftermath of people throwing dustbins on top of coots' nests, damaging the floating nests as well as coot chicks and eggs. Flytipping is another concern.
At lunchtime Myers shows me how to operate the locks, which open for leisure and commercial boats. Bow Creek is tidal, flowing directly into the Thames, meaning she is often called out when there is a flood alert. "If the water level gets close to 7m we're in real trouble," she says. "But we've got the weir gates to help. Canals are a really useful way of helping London control flooding. They can be used to take water away from problem areas and out to sea."
In the afternoon we head south, along the straight Limehouse Cut, built in around 1766, arrowing for two miles from Bow Locks through the London borough of Tower Hamlets to Limehouse Basin, where it connects with the Hertford Union Canal, and on up to Birmingham and the north.
In its heyday, Limehouse Basin was a working dock, a place of intense activity as foreign cargoes were unloaded on to narrowboats and transported to the north. Today it is more of a marina, bursting with luxury cruisers and houseboats, towered over by expensive housing and waterside restaurants. Myers monitors how the cormorants are doing on a little island within the Basin, and we watch as they walk on water before taking flight.
She sees that a couple of floating nests used by the birds are falling into disrepair, and makes a note of it.
"It's going to be even nicer here during the next couple of years," she says. "They're building pontoons for more boats and for waterbuses to ferry Olympic spectators. We'll be busier, which is wonderful, but I hope the wildlife is looked after."
Back at Bow Locks, Myers explains that boats of any type must book 24 hours in advance to get through the tidal gates. There are no more scheduled for today, but she has plenty more booked in for the rest of the week.
"There's rarely a dull moment," she says, "because there's so much to do. People often think it's just working the locks, but there's so much more to the job than that." And she heads off once again to attack that pondweed.
Curriculum vitae Salary £13,000-£18,000 plus London allowance
Hours Core hours are 8am-4pm, and there is a rota between 4pm and 8am to cover those emergency callouts. Myers is on call roughly once every three weeks.
Work-life balance "When you're on call the job can impinge on your home life – you have to forget about going to the cinema or theatre – but I tend to balance it all quite happily. It helps that work is often home from home for me."
Best thing "Coming off a busy road into this wonderful, quiet environment. To be in the middle of the city, but in such a lovely, calm place."
Worst thing Bad winters, when you get iced in for five or six days. "It is frustrating and difficult to cut through the ice to allow vehicles to pass through."
Article can be found at: http://www.theguardian.com/money/2010/oct/23/working-life-lock-keeper