I got an email 3 days ago from M … “On going on my regular Abingdon to Oxford Thames path walk last Sunday I was shocked and upset to see that all the old riverside trees from opposite Nuneham Park boathouse for some miles upriver have been cut down to stumps. Parts of the lovely river walk resembled a war zone or nightmare landscape. Cut branches and trunks had been left lying beside the path, some with buds that will now not develop and underfoot the mud has been churned up by the heavy vehicles that must have been used to do this. I have searched local papers and looked online to find out why this has happened but have been unable to find anything. I do not know if you know anything about this but feel that I cannot be the only person who has noticed or think it deserves a comment.”

I spoke with a dog walker, today. He said walking through these trees used to be so magical, but now they have been destroyed it looks quite bland. He says the trees overhanging the river need chopping back from time to time but not like this. People were shocked.

A lot of the trees are now stacked ready for collection.

Abingdon Lock is having maintenance work done this winter.

Two years ago the lock was emptied of water and the lock chamber was relined.

This winter the lock gates are being taken away and strengthened. The upper gates have already been done.

The lower gates have been taken away and will return before the end of the month.

As there are no boats and no floods this winter the Lock Keeper has been clearing the wild area behind the lock. He has been pollarding trees and making fences from the wood, and intends to create wild flower banks on that side.

It will be very interesting to see how it looks in the months to come.

Shares in Abingdon Hydro went on sale this morning at the Guildhall in Abingdon. The share offer is open until 20th December.

This community project, with plans to generate electricity from the Thames in Abingdon, has had a long journey to get this far… getting planning permission, and approval from the Environment Agency, and answering questions from anglers. 10% of the projects costs are to fund a new fish pass.

They now hope to raise £1.25m from people in the local community to finance the project. There is a risk with the investment, but against the risk is a government tax offer. The earliest investors in this renewable energy project got a 50% tax relief on their investment, and others get 30% tax relief.

Along the River Thames different groups, some private, some community financed, are putting in Archimedes screws near locks to generate electricity. Thanks to the hard work of Richard Riggs and others the Abingdon Hydro will be largely community financed .

The current flow of the River Thames at Abingdon Weir would be what is needed to keep generating at near full power.

Find out more at Abingdon Hydro.

There has been a pile of sandbags outside the Abingdon Water Treatment Works for some time. The bags were used in the winter floods. There is no report of there being anything like the dangers of flooding at Abingdon’s water treatment works as experienced elsewhere – and reported in the Not Abingdon Blog.

The Abingdon Water Treatment works had a recent upgrade in 2012 at a cost of £3m.

The Borough Records show that the Thames Conservancy started writing to Abingdon Corporation back in about 1867 requesting them to initiate measures to stop the flow of sewage into the River Thames at Abingdon Bridge and St Helen’s Church. They wrote again in 1869 asking what action was being taken. By 1873 the conservatory were threatening Abingdon with legal action to force compliance.

The Town Clerk, wrote back to explain that a Committee had been looking at the issue, and had visited various sewage treatment schemes nationally.

But in 1875 Abingdon Corporation decided to do take action sooner rather than later. The Corporation borrowed about £19K from the Public Works Loan Commission, purchased land from a farmer in Sutton Wick, and created the Sewage Farm, that has through numerous upgrades become the concrete clad chambers and towers that are there today. I guess that a Sewage Farm involved allowing sewage to settle over larger areas of land.