The social production of small urban rivers: The (re)making of two riverside spaces in Lewisham

Abstract

This article analyses how small urban rivers are implicated in different registers of place-making in Lewisham, London. We discuss the pleasures, possibilities and tensions that come with ‘opening up’ urban river spaces and the complex range of imaginaries and practices that feed into their production. Using a combination of archival research alongside qualitative methods, we set out how river spaces are produced by informal and formal practices including their rendering in official documents, their maintenance by local river groups (stewardship) and the daily routines of local people (authorship). The article argues that these sites pose questions about active forms of access and about the right to remake place. We further develop sociological engagements with water that have provided a rich account of how people live with water.