The Great Thames Barrage

Chapter 8: The Thames Estuary.

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An engineering proposal argues for construction of a barrage across the lower Thames between Gravesend and Tilbury to create a non-tidal inland reservoir and maintain consistent deep navigation to central London, eliminating dredging, tide-waiting, and grounding, and improving safety and loading operations. The pamphlet catalogs complaints about inadequate depth, delays, overlapping authorities, high costs, and hazardous navigation, critiques dredging and administrative reforms as insufficient, surveys analogous international proposals, and advocates dockisation with locks and sluices as a comprehensive remedy while discussing technical, economic, and operational implications.

The Thames Estuary.

From Gravesend to the Nore is an immense triangular area with sandy bottom, muddy foreshores and several deep channels running in the general direction of the Essex coast line, that is, N.E. to the North Sea. The area may be roughly estimated at 120 square miles, and the navigable depth of the principal channels at from 60 ft. to 26 ft. at low water Spring tides.

The volume of the estuary at high water Spring tides may be taken at 2600 million cubic yards, and at low water Spring tides at 1500 million cubic yards, the volumes of the river from Gravesend to Teddington being respectively 180 million and 80 million cubic yards, so that the volume of tidal water entering the river each tide is about 100 million cubic yards.