An £8.7m visitor centre in east London has opened at a 500-acre Thames Water site. The Walthamstow Wetlands project allows visitors to enjoy and learn about the Walthamstow Reservoirs’ built and natural heritage. Because the area includes water treatment stations and other operational sites it needed protection to separate public areas from critical national infrastructure (CNI), for which Thames Water has ordered security fencing through Binns Fencing.
Binns have installed ArmaWeave, HiSec and Axiom steel mesh from parent company Zaun around some Thames Water assets, while Duo fencing, sliding gates and railings have been included at all main entrances. Oak Habitat gates and post and wire fencing provide a more natural boundary to non-secure areas.
The principal contractor of the project was family-run London-based construction company Rooff.
The area’s distinctive nature stems from the site’s importance as a historic operational landscape that supplies drinking water to London, and its bio-diversity, of international importance for water birds. The idea is to create a ‘green core’ of naturalised landscape at the reservoir with a pathway through the centre of the site and connecting to the pedestrian and cycle route through the middle of the Lee Valley.
The project was designed by architect Witherford Watson Mann and landscape architects KLA, with engineers P3r and TALL, consultants Studio Dekka and collaborating organisation Counterculture also involved.
The reservoirs’ importance as a potential nature reserve was recognised as early as 1945 by Professor Patrick Abercrombie, who said: “A series of great reservoirs [is] acquiring a charm of [its] own as trees grow round them and on their little islands – they are becoming nature reserves for large numbers of birds and the resort of privileged fisherman. These areas are a great open-air lung to the crowded East End – their preservation is essential…Every piece of open land should be welded into a great regional reservation.”
