The Ride of Your Life on the DLR

We tend to think that living in the city has reduced our ability to find joy in simple things, apart from perhaps crepes and instant sushi. That is until you board the front carriage of the Docklands Light Railway after a couple of pints.

While the Overground carves its way along ancient gutters across London, the 1987 DLR feels more like a cross between a rickety mine-shaft railway and a sci-fi moonbase. It undulates and meanders on a raised network. Ride from the old factories of Limehouse to the plate glass and shimmering offices of the redeveloped Docklands and you will find it is like sitting in the front seat of a bus, times ten.

Bank to Greenwich by DLR

Are we serious? Well, yes! A packed and unappealing commuter route during the week, the DLR network is very quiet at weekends. To many of us, Greenwich feels a long way from the city and Canary Wharf stands like an outpost in some far reach of an Empire, just beyond the city wall. The reality is they sit just 20 minutes from Bank along the DLR.

As soon as you come of the city tunnel the view is rather unimpressive with wall to wall concrete tower blocks. Give it time and you will see all the layers that make up a city, with urban wastelands next to luxury residences, old cranes and plate glass. To the poet, artist or flaneur the result is a fascinating cross-section like an MRI scan of a body, offering a glimpse of the lives that make up the city.

The Isle of Dogs is believed to have one of the country’s biggest pay gaps with major social housing developments right beside Canary Wharf.

You can get a panoramic view of the iconic Canary Wharf through the windows of a driverless train for the price of an Oyster ticket. On a sunny day the shimmering waters below are reflected in the crystal chandelier of corporate skyscrapers. At the end awaits Greenwich with the Cutty Sark, Royal Maritime Museum, Royal Observatory and more.

The DLR Route

Bank: You start underneath the city but unlike the Underground this circular tube is large and well lit. The glass train means you feel like a futuristic pilot as you snake through this winding tunnel .

Shadwell & Limehouse: Perhaps an archetypal image of redevelopment, these East-End docks have a history ranging from Victorian opium dens to the first outbreak of cholera in London.

Westferry: Sorry, not every part of London can be interesting.

West India Quay, Canary Wharf and Heron Quays: These are the main stops on the Canary Wharf development. This is where you can explore the labyrinth of Europe’s tallest buildings towering over the Thames.

South Quay: See the Pan Peninsular towers, residential skyscrapers with the most overpriced student-style accommodation you can imagine. 

Crossharbour: Nothing particularly exciting but nearby is the St John social housing estate that John Betjeman admired.

Mudchute: This is an entertaining stop name after taking in the hubristic architecture of corporate excess. They can’t be seen from the train but the  concrete bases of WWII anti-aircraft gun batteries are still intact here.

Cutty Sark & Greenwich: The railway itself no longer offers good viewing at this end of the journey but you have reached Greenwich itself, which has plenty to see. .

Stewart Vickers @vickhellfire

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