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Island Gardens is a public park located at the southern end of the Greenwich Hospital from the North Bank of the Thames – National Maritime Museum
/ref>
The park also gave its name to
Isle of Dogs
The Isle of Dogs is a large peninsula bounded on three sides by a large meander in the River Thames in East London, England, which includes the Cubitt Town, Millwall and Canary Wharf districts. The area was historically part of the Manor, Ha ...
in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets on the north bank of the River Thames
The River Thames ( ), known alternatively in parts as the River Isis, is a river that flows through southern England including London. At , it is the longest river entirely in England and the second-longest in the United Kingdom, after the R ...
. The park was formally opened on 3 August 1895 by local politician Will Crooks
William Crooks (6 April 1852 – 5 June 1921) was a noted trade unionist and politician from Poplar, London, and a member of the Fabian Society. He is particularly remembered for his campaigning work against poverty and inequality.
Early life ...
.
The waterside park is notable for its cross-river view of the classical buildings of the former Greenwich Hospital, the ''Cutty Sark
''Cutty Sark'' is a British clipper ship. Built on the River Leven, Dumbarton, Scotland in 1869 for the Jock Willis Shipping Line, she was one of the last tea clippers to be built and one of the fastest, coming at the end of a long period ...
'' and the National Maritime Museum
The National Maritime Museum (NMM) is a maritime museum in Greenwich, London. It is part of Royal Museums Greenwich, a network of museums in the Maritime Greenwich World Heritage Site. Like other publicly funded national museums in the Unite ...
, with Greenwich Park
Greenwich Park is a former hunting park in Greenwich and one of the largest single green spaces in south-east London. One of the Royal Parks of London, and the first to be enclosed (in 1433), it covers , and is part of the Greenwich World Heritag ...
forming a backdrop. The northern entrance of the Greenwich foot tunnel
The Greenwich Foot Tunnel crosses beneath the River Thames in East London, linking Greenwich (Royal Borough of Greenwich) on the south bank with Millwall (London Borough of Tower Hamlets) on the north. Approximately 4,000 people use the tunnel ...
is also within the park. It is almost certain that the view from this location is the one that the Canaletto
Giovanni Antonio Canal (18 October 1697 – 19 April 1768), commonly known as Canaletto (), was an Italian painter from the Republic of Venice, considered an important member of the 18th-century Venetian school.
Painter of city views or ...
painting "Greenwich Hospital from the North Bank of the Thames" is taken from, though whether Canaletto himself actually visited the site is in doubt./ref>
The park also gave its name to Island Gardens DLR station
Island Gardens is a Docklands Light Railway (DLR) station next to Island Gardens on the Isle of Dogs, East London. It is just north of the River Thames and is close to the southern tip of the Isle of Dogs and the River Thames.
Island Gardens is ...
. This opened in 1987 as the southern terminus of the DLR's initial system, and was an elevated terminal station situated to the west of the park. The later construction of the DLR extension to Lewisham
Lewisham () is an area of southeast London, England, south of Charing Cross. It is the principal area of the London Borough of Lewisham, and was within the historic county of Kent until 1889. It is identified in the London Plan as one of ...
involved a tunnel
A tunnel is an underground passageway, dug through surrounding soil, earth or rock, and enclosed except for the entrance and exit, commonly at each end. A pipeline is not a tunnel, though some recent tunnels have used immersed tube cons ...
under the Thames, and Island Gardens station was relocated about north, close to the northern entrance to the tunnel by Millwall Park. The new station is largely underground; the original elevated station was demolished.
References