After the failure of the £15m London Thames Gateway Development Corporation scheme to open up Bow Creek with a riverside path there comes very surprising news

There is a plan to span a blockage just south of Three Mills this summer.

A wide path already runs south along the east side of the tidal Lea until it hits Cody Dock. This was built in 1870 for the Imperial Gas Company which needed to receive coal by barge.

Recently Simon Myers came up Bow Creek by boat and discovered the derelict dock. He has set up the Gasworks Dock Partnership charity which is redeveloping the site for live/work units and ship repairing.

Best of all he plans to have a wooden bascule bridge in operation this year to carry the Lea Valley Walk over the dock and allow it to continue to Trinity Buoy Wharf and East India Dock.

For this to happen £140,252 is needed by Wednesday 6 June -the day after the Jubilee weekend.

£56,418 has been raised since the appeal was launched last month.

Billy Bragg, whose grandfather worked in the dock, and John Suchet are backing the plan.

Stephen Timms MP has visited and described the project as “a great initiative”.

Details can be found on the Cody Dock website.