Geograph - photograph every grid square

Not to be confused with the ancient track also known as the Ridgeway, this is a public path along the top of London's Southern Outfall sewer where it runs inside an embankment for about 5km from Plumstead to the sewage treatment works at Crossness. See Link for the walking route, and Link for the sewer itself.


After several years when it became overgrown and nearly impassable in places, Greenwich council upgraded their section of the Ridgeway in 2015. The Bexley section remains unimproved at the time of writing.

Thamesmead was developed as a new town in the 1960s, '70s and '80s by the Greater London Council. It is situated on the south side of the River Thames, between Woolwich and Erith. Much of Thamesmead is built on reclaimed marshland.

The earlier phases of building were brutalist blocks of flats built from concrete, with connecting walkways above street level. later phases included more traditional street patterns with terraced housing.

When first built, Thamesmead's brutalist architecture was used as a film location, for Stanley Kubrick's "A Clockwork Orange".

The Green Chain Walk is a network of paths in south-east London that connects locations including the Thames Barrier, Thamesmead and Erith along the river, and at the other end Crystal Palace and Chislehurst.

The route was created in 1977 by a joint team of four London boroughs. What makes it distinctive is the way it connects parks and other open spaces as far as possible, including fragments of ancient woodland at Oxleas and Lesnes Abbey Woods, heathland at Plumstead Common and large parks such as Avery Hill and Crystal Palace. The longest continuous route is Thamesmead to Crystal Palace (26.5km), with many links making up the total of 64km.

The official website is Link