| Walk Notes |
This route covers in a meandering fashion the Lower Colne Valley, from the Colne’s meeting with the Thames upstream through Staines Moor and Stanwell Moor to Heathrow Airport, east of Longfordmoor.
From the station, you make your way to the Thames and turn upstream past the mouth of the Colne and under Staines Bridge, site of the only Roman bridge across the Thames outside of London, before turning through old Staines and under one of many busy roads into Staines Moor. The moor is dominated by the meandering Colne, many low-lying flooded areas, bulrushes and reeds, scattered trees, imposing bramble bushes and myriads of very old anthills, as well as a varied birdlife all year round.
Apart from the Thames and the Colne, several other rivers (the Wraybury River, an anabranch of the Colne, and three distributaries of it: the Sweeps Ditch and the Longford and Duke of Cumberland Rivers), plenty of drainage ditches and some reservoirs and ponds make this a very ‘watery’ walk. Combined with a high water table, some areas can be water-soaked, muddy or even impassable after heavy rain.
A significantly shorter circular walk leads further through Staines Moor onto a modest rise for surround views and back along the Colne and Wraysbury rivers to the town centre and railway station.
Note 1: Outside of Staines, the route is affected by noise from the M25 and/or the airport runways.
Note 2: Some parts of the route through Staines Moor can be impassable after prolonged heavy rain.
Note 3: During ground nesting season (01/03-31/07), dogs must be kept on a lead on Staines Moor.
Note 4: The final stretch into Heathrow Airport (which is private ground) leads along road pavements that are signed as ‘Cyclists Only’. This is not adhered to by locals, including some Heathrow employees, but – technically – walking along them is trespassing. If you are uncomfortable with this, the alternative are frequent buses from the Moor Bridge stop, either to T5 (not TfL) or to Hounslow West Underground (TfL).
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| Notes |
Staines (Staines-upon-Thames)
Staines-upon-Thames, commonly known as Staines, is a market town in northwest Surrey, around 28 kilometres west of Charing Cross. It is in the Borough of Spelthorne, at the confluence of the Thames and the Colne. Historically part of Middlesex, the town was transferred to Surrey in 1965.
The earliest evidence of human activity in the area is from the Paleolithic and, during the Neolithic, there was a causewayed enclosure on Staines Moor. The first bridge across the Thames at Staines is thought to have been built by the Romans as part of their road from London to Silchester. Both the Thames and Colne are thought to have had multiple channels during this period, which may have necessitated the building of more than one bridge though, perhaps explaining the Roman name for the place: ‘Ad Pontes’ (Bridges). They and London Bridge remained the only Thames bridges for another 500 years!
There was a settlement in the area around the modern High Street by the end of the 1st century CE.
Throughout the Middle Ages, Staines (from Anglo-Saxon ‘Stana’ = Stones) was primarily an agricultural settlement and was held by Westminster Abbey. The first surviving record of a market is from 1218, but one may have taken place earlier near St. Mary's Church, where the main settlement had moved to in the late Anglo-Saxon period. In 1179, King Richard I sold the rights to the River Thames from the estuary to Staines to the Corporation of the City of London, to finance another crusade. The ‘London Stone’ (a replica is passed on the walk) is one of the boundary stones.
The current Staines Bridge, designed by George Rennie, was opened in 1832 and the first railway line through Staines opened in 1848. The town became a centre for linoleum manufacture in 1864.
At the end of the 20th century, Staines became infamous as the home town of the fictional film and television character, Ali G. Partly in response to the reaction to the character, Spelthorne Borough Council voted in 2011 to add the suffix "upon-Thames" to the official name of the town.
River Colne
The River Colne is a 58 km/36 mi long Thames tributary that springs in the North Weald in Hertfordshire and flows through it for about half its length, before forming the boundary between Hertfordshire, then Buckinghamshire and the London Borough of Hillingdon. West of Heathrow Airport it flows into Surrey and joins the Thames in Staines-upon-Thames.
The Colne becomes universally so-named after two close subterranean streams converge at a spring (or in very wet weather in the meadows above) along the east side of North Mymms Park. The source streams are long, multi-source, in their final, northern stages, partly underground tributaries: a north-eastern, which can be considered the Upper Colne, and the Mimmshall Brook. Their main sources are in western Northaw, Brookmans Park, Hadley and Borehamwood. The Colne’s main tributaries are the Potters Bar Brook and River Pinn (left) and the Rivers Ver, Gade, Chess and Misbourne (right).
The Wraysbury River is an ‘anabranch’ of the Colne, leaving it at West Drayton and re-joining it in Staines’ town centre. Two of its distributaries in the same area can be likened to The New River off the River Lea, although their main purpose was not drinking water: the 19 km Longford River supplies Hampton Court Park (built 1638/39) and Bushy Park (from 1710), and the earlier Duke of Northumberland River supplies the Duke of Northumberland's estate at Syon Park.
Digging for gravel and clay along its lower course near Rickmansworth has created a belt of flooded pits below the water table, as established lakes.
Colne Valley Way
The Colne Valley Way is the southern part of a 33 km/20.4 mi long waymarked trail following the River Colne (often at some distance) from Rickmansworth through the Colne Valley Regional Park to Staines-upon-Thames. North of Colnbrook the trail is referred to as the Colne River Trail.
Heathrow Terminal 5
Heathrow’s Terminal 5 (T5) opened in 2008, and the main building in the complex is the largest free-standing structure in the UK at 396 x 176 x 40 metres. The lead architects for T5 were Richard Rogers Partnership. In 2018, T5 handled 32.1 million passengers on 211,000 flights, beyond its design capacity of 30 million. It stands on a 260-hectare (640-acre) site on the western side of the airport formerly occupied by the Perry Oaks sewage works and an area of smallholdings. Two artificial watercourses, the Longford River and the Duke of Northumberland's River, originally ran through the middle of the site and had to be diverted and the A3044 dual carriageway and Western Perimeter Road had to be realigned.
A preparatory archaeological dig at the site found more than 80,000 artefacts, including 18,000 pieces of pottery, 40,000 pieces of worked flint, and a wooden bowl dating to the Middle Bronze Age, around 3,000 years ago. Earthworks were also discovered, including a pathway and evidence of agricultural boundaries.
The building cost £4.2 billion and took almost 20 years from conception to completion, including the longest public inquiry in British history. On the day of opening, it became apparent that the terminal was not operating as planned, forcing British Airways to cancel 34 flights and suspend baggage check-in. Over the following 10 days some 42,000 bags failed to travel with their owners, and over 500 flights were cancelled. The difficulties were later blamed on a number of problems with the terminal's IT systems, coupled with car parking. As a result, BA's director of operations and director of customer services were sacked.
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