Abbey Mills Pumping Station

The original Abbey Mills Pumping Station, in Mill Meads, East London, is a sewage pumping station, designed by engineer Joseph Bazalgette, Edmund Cooper, and architect Charles Driver. It was built between 1865 and 1868, housing eight beam engines by Rothwell & Co. of Bolton. Two engines on each arm of a cruciform plan, with an elaborate Byzantine style, described as The Cathedral of Sewage.[1] Another of Bazalgette's designs, Crossness Pumping Station, is located south of the River Thames at Crossness, at the end of the Southern Outfall Sewer.

Abbey Mills Pumping Station
Location in London Borough of Newham
Alternative names"The Cathedral of Sewage"
General information
Statusin use
Typepumping station
Architectural styleItalian Gothic
AddressAbbey Lane, West Ham
Town or cityLondon
CountryEngland
Coordinates51.5307°N 0.000835°W / 51.5307; -0.000835
Construction started1865
Completed1868
Design and construction
ArchitectCharles Driver, Edmund Cooper
EngineerJoseph Bazalgette
Listed Building – Grade II*
Designated6 November 1974
Reference no.1190476

A modern sewage pumping station (Station F) was completed in 1997[2] about 200 metres (660 ft) south of the original station.

History

The pumping station was built at the site of an earlier watermill owned by the former Stratford Langthorne Abbey, from which it gained its name. It was first recorded as Wiggemulne in 1312, i.e., "the mill of a man called Wicga", an Old English personal name, and subsequently became associated with the abbey.[3] The Abbey lay between the Channelsea River and Marsh Lane (Manor Road). It was dissolved in 1538. By 1840, the North Woolwich railway ran through the site, and it began to be used to establish factories, and ultimately the sewage pumping stations.[4]

Purpose

The pumps raised the sewage in the London sewerage system between the two Low Level Sewers and the Northern Outfall Sewer, which was built in the 1860s to carry the increasing amount of sewage produced in London away from the centre of the city.

Details of the pumps in the year 1912/13 were as follows:[5]

Abbey Mills pumps (1912/13)
Pump Sewage pumped, million gallons Average lift, ft Working costs
Beam engines 34,100 36.69 £19,801
Worthington engines 6,215 40.56 £6,234

The pumping capability was increased with the addition of gas engine driven pumps. Details of the operation of the pumps in the year 1919/20 were as follows:[6]

Abbey Mills pumps (1919/20)
Pump Sewage pumped, million gallons Average lift, ft Working costs
Beam engines 35,604.8 35.48 £46,767
Worthington engines 5,921.5 38.34 £16,117
Gas engines 3,209.4 39.66 £13,284

Two Moorish styled chimneys – unused since steam power had been replaced by electric motors in 1933 – were demolished in 1941, as it was feared that a strike from German bombs might topple them onto the pumping station.

The building still houses electric pumps – to be used to assist the new facility next door when required.

The main building is grade II* listed and there are many grade II-listed ancillary buildings, including the stumps of the demolished chimneys.

Modern pumping station
The new Abbey Mills Pumping Station (Station F)

The modern pumping station (Station F) was designed by architects Allies and Morrison. The original building (Station A) has electrical pumps and these are used to assist the modern pumping station during high flows if required. It is one of the three principal London pumping stations dealing with foul water. Both pumping stations are able to discharge flows directly into the Lee Tunnel.

One of the world's largest installation of drum screens to treat sewage was constructed as part of the Thames Tideway Scheme. The site is managed and operated by Thames Water.

Lee Tunnel

Lee Tunnel is a sewage tunnel that travels from Abbey Mills to Beckton Sewage Works and is designed to handle the 16 million tons of overflow sewage that was previously discharged into the River Lea each year. Thames Water began construction in 2012 and in early 2016 it was opened for service.[7][8]

  • Door at Abbey Mills Pumping Station
  • Interior
  • Lantern in Station A
  • Station C

References
  1. McConnell, Sara (4 January 2006). "An Olympic walk in East London". The Times. Retrieved 11 February 2011. ...one of London's most startling sites – Abbey Mills Pumping Station with its red and green Moorish domes. Built in 1863 as part of London's then new sewage system, it was nicknamed the Cathedral of Sewage.
  2. "ABBEY MILLS PUMPING STATION - Allies and Morrison". alliesandmorrison.com. Retrieved 9 October 2015.
  3. Mills, A. D. (2010). A Dictionary of London Place-Names. Oxford University Press. p. 1. ISBN 9780199566785.
  4. West Ham: Stratford Abbey, A History of the County of Essex: Volume 6 (1973), pp. 112–14. Retrieved 20 February 2007
  5. London County Council (1915). London Statistics 1912-13 vol. XXIV. London: London County Council. p. 203.
  6. London County Council (1922). London Statistics 1920-21 vol. XXVII. London: London County Council. p. 99.
  7. "'Busy Lizzie' arrives in London to dig Lee Tunnel". Thames Water. Archived from the original on 26 March 2016. Retrieved 27 March 2016.
  8. Amy Ashenden; Luke Garrett (28 January 2016). "Boris Johnson opens new 'super sewer' Lee Tunnel". London Evening Standard. Archived from the original on 28 January 2016. Retrieved 27 March 2016.
This article is issued from Wikipedia. The text is licensed under Creative Commons - Attribution - Sharealike. Additional terms may apply for the media files.