Otter Dock


Otter Dock was a branch of the Grand Junction Canal in England. In March 1818, permission was obtained from the Grand Junction Canal Company for a dock to be built to service Yiewsley’s brickworks. Otter dock was opened in 1820 and after several extensions stretched 1,200 yards north from the mainline of the canal. With the inclusion of the arms within Otter dock, its total length was 1845 yards. Bricks were moulded and fired in Yiewsley’s brick-fields and transported via the Otter Dock and the Grand Junction Canal Paddington Arm to the South Wharf in the Paddington Basin and to wharves situated along the Regent's Canal. The bricks were then used in the construction of 19th-century London.
By the beginning of the 20th century, the brick-fields and the later gravel pits which the Otter Dock served had been worked out. Work started to fill in Otter Dock north of Horton Road in 1909 and was completed in 1911. In 1910 chestnut and beech trees were planted along the filled-in canal between the recently constructed Ernest Road and Colham Road in the southern section of the former Arm. The roads were renamed Colham Avenue in 1938. The wide boulevard of Poplar Avenue was part of the northern section of the Arm.