Cody Dock, Canning Town & Leamouth : Know Your Neighbourhood | LFA 2026

25 Jun

In this episode of Talking Place, recorded as part of the Know Your Neighbourhood series in partnership with the London Festival of Architecture 2026, Tanisha Raffiuddin sits down with Simon Myers and Bella Quirin from Cody Dock. They talk about what belonging means when you've built it - literally - with your own hands, why the long-term view changes every conversation, and what they'd like to see in the River Lea in a thousand years. Cody Dock sits on the River Lee in East London - directly on the Greenwich Meridian Line, north of the O2. It has a rolling bridge that is the first of its kind in the world, a reed bed that survived the ice age, and a heritage centre whose roof is made from the last ship built in East London. And it is run by a community that holds a 999-year lease.

In this episode, you will discover:

• What Cody Dock is and why people are surprised when they arrive

• Collective ownership as the foundation of belonging

• 4,000 volunteers a year - and 400 names carved into a 12-tonne rolling bridge

• The 999-year lease and thinking beyond short-term regeneration

• The historic lifeboat and its role in the new heritage centre

• Ecology: kingfishers, seals, the German hairy snail, and the dream of oysters back in the Lea

• What the River Lea has been, and what it could become

• Connectivity as the missing piece in East London's regeneration

Guests: Simon Myers and Bella Quirin, Cody Dock.

Host: Tanisha Raffiuddin, Creative Director, Concept Culture.

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