Aqueducts to straighten the flow
The New River crossing the Turkey Brook
The engineers who built the New River four hundred years ago were extraordinarily skilled. They had the confidence and ability to create a canal with an even drop of just 13 cm per mile for many miles.
Gravity feed
When it opened in 1613 the New River was 40 miles long. Water flowed along the channel from Hertfordshire under gravity to meet the demands of the growing population of London when the water from the Thames was no longer safe to drink.
The engineers channelled the curving route all along the the 100 foot (30.5m) contour. The resulting canal was nearly twice the straight line distance from its Hertfordshire source to Islington.
Aqueducts to shorten the route
In the 1800s many of the old loops were abandoned such as the one that carried the water along a three-and-a-half mile diversion westwards through Whitewebbs Park to Crewe Hill near Enfield Chase to keep on the contour line. You can still see traces of the old route among the trees west of Forty Hall.
To create a direct route, the engineers threw up embankments, dug tunnels and carried the water across river valleys on aqueducts. One of these aqueducts still carries the New River over the Turkey Brook. A little further south, underground pipes replace the winding loop around Enfield.
Crossing the M25
More recently, in the late 1900s, the water company had to engineer a new aqueduct to carry the water over the M25.
Today, water is still extracted from the New River at Turkey Street, Enfield, and piped to the King George V Reservoirs. This water is cleaned at the Water Treatment Works at Walthamstow
Submitted by: Andrew Hunt, 21 January 2007
