May 1^st1992 marked the first day of Platform’s project ‘Still Waters’: a month of street-based actions, walks, talks and art-interventions across the Fleet, Walbrook, Effra and Wandle, four river valleys in central London.

from London Under London, Trench & Hillman

Still Waters reframed London as a watershed. It aimed to reclaim London’s rivers from their invisible, mostly sewerised state, and begin action to resurrect them. It saw the fate of London’s rivers in the context of the upsurge of a right-wing, free-market agenda in Britain at that time: Poison me, Bury me, Forget me*.

Go here for a summary of what we did on each river.

The project took place along the river Fleet (Hampstead & Highgate to Blackfriars), Walbrook (Moorgate to Cannon Street), Effra (Norwood to Vauxhall), and Lower Wandle (Beddington to Wandsworth Town). The major practical impacts were that it led on to our art-ecology- energy projects “Merton Island” and “Delta” which produced locally sourced renewable power from the river Wandle. These in turn led to the founding of a new charity Renewable Energy in the Urban Environment (later joining with Carbon Descent).

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