In 1965 the Inland Waterways Association held its National Rally of Boats at Blackburn.
Two years later it was held in Leicester and the second of the old IWA Bulletins I bought at Foxton earlier this summer covers it.
The most interesting photograph is the one above, whose caption includes the following:
But Leicester still faces problems, such as ... its present treatment of the Grand Union alongside the power station at Freeman's Meadow Lock, a perfect setting for large scale redevelopment.I went to the lock today to see if I could replicate this photograph of the weir - the Grand Union merges with the River Soar for its journey through Leicester - with the railway bridge behind it.
It must have been taken from the power station as the industrial buildings in the background are the gas works off Aylestone Road.
The writer of the caption got his way as the power station site is now occupied by Leicester City's King Power Stadium.
I took the photograph below from its car park today.
The 1967 photo, by my calculation, was taken from a vantage point now occupied by the car park of the neighbouring Holiday Inn.
But the river bank is fenced off there and trees have grown up, so my attempt to replicate it was defeated.
Freeman's Meadow Lock, which is right next to a weir, is still a remarkable spot. I took lots more photos there today and will share them with you another time.
I realise this post is pretty old now, but just came across it. This photo was taken from the little island which lies between the south end of the weir and the riverward side of Freemen’s Weir lock, a site you can still visit (very easily since a railed crossing has been added to the lock gate). So it was actually taken from the east side of the river, not the King Power stadium side, and the lock is just right of the viewpoint. (The last of the gas holders was taken down a few years ago.)
ReplyDeleteCorrection: I should have put “The original photo….” and I mean “Freemen’s Meadow lock”. Incidentally, despite cycling this way literally hundreds of times over the years, I noticed a couple of days ago for the very first time (in the low winter sun), carved into the stone just below the lock, the marker for the flood height of 31 December 1900. Amazing, and a subsequent search of the newspapers tells of the flooding of the gasworks and the subsidence of that railway bridge by 18 inches, all despite the “Mile Straight” having been constructed only a decade previously.
ReplyDeleteThanks for this!
ReplyDelete