Removals in Tower Bridge, SE1

House removals Tower Bridge: the warehouse streets east of the bridge

When people say they live at Tower Bridge, they nearly always mean the Southwark side, in the block of streets between the bridge approach and St Saviour’s Dock. Southwark’s Tower Bridge Conservation Area appraisal draws the edges plainly: Tooley Street to the south, Tower Bridge Road to the west, the river to the north and St Saviour’s Dock to the east. It describes the area as compact and contained, reachable only from minor streets north of Tooley Street, with pedestrians also able to walk in from the riverside through an arch under the bridge. That single fact shapes almost every move we do here. The van cannot simply pull up outside on a main road. It has to come off Tooley Street and find its way into a grid of narrow streets that were built for carts and hand barrows.

The council first designated the area in September 1978, the Historic Buildings Council called it outstanding a month later, and the London Docklands Development Corporation extended it in December 1985. By then the wharves had closed, and through the 1980s and 1990s many of the warehouses were refurbished and converted, mostly into flats, with offices, shops and restaurants on the lower floors. So the move you are planning is very likely out of a converted warehouse or a newer block built in its style, and the questions we ask first are about the building, the floor and the way in.

Butler’s Wharf and the densest warehouses in London

For about a century the dominant business here was Butler’s Wharf Ltd. The appraisal records that its riverside range was rebuilt from the 1870s, and that in the 1880s and 1890s the landward blocks were rebuilt too, mostly to about six storeys, producing what it calls the densest warehousing in London, running inland as far as Gainsford Street. The buildings were tied together at high level by iron gangways across the streets. Those gangways and loading platforms are still there on many fronts, and in the listed Butlers Wharf (west) building, the Cardamom Building at 31 Shad Thames and 35–37 Shad Thames on the Lafone Street corner, the catwalks now serve as balconies for the flats inside.

A warehouse flat is a very different job from a terraced house. The rooms are large and open, the furniture tends to be large to match, and it almost always came in through a lift. Before we price, we ask for the inside dimensions of that lift and its door, whether it is a passenger lift or a goods lift, and who books it. A long corner sofa that went up in a goods lift when the flat was new may not fit the passenger lift you have today. If you are unsure, our guide to what to do when a piece is too big for the door or lift explains the options, from taking legs and backs off to deciding before the day that a piece should be sold rather than moved.

Shad Thames: seven metres between the walls

Shad Thames itself is the spine of the area, and it is narrow. The appraisal gives the figure: for most of its length the street is no more than 7 metres wide, with buildings of six storeys or more built right to its edge on both sides. At the western entrance, where the Anchor Brewhouse faces Tower Bridge Court on the corner of Horselydown Lane, it is barely 7 metres. In the western section the surface has been relaid in cobbles and flagstones flush with each other, with no raised kerb, because the street is mainly used on foot.

For a removal that means three things. First, the vehicle. A 3.5-tonne Luton sits comfortably in a street that width; a 7.5-tonne lorry fills it, so for larger homes we often stage the lorry nearby and run a smaller van to the door. Second, the surface. Cobbles are hard on trolleys and on anything carried on them, so we wheel on pneumatic tyres, keep loads low and wrap every piece as if it will be carried the whole way. Third, people. A shared surface with restaurants along it is busy with walkers, so a member of the crew stays with the van and keeps the path clear while the rest carry.

Queen Elizabeth Street, Gainsford Street and the newer blocks

Behind Shad Thames, between Horselydown Lane and the west side of the street, most of what stands today was built or rebuilt from the 1980s onwards. The best-known landmark is The Circle on Queen Elizabeth Street, designed by CZWG, with its blue-tiled walls, its dray-horse statue and seven storeys of flats behind chunky timber balconies. Older survivors give a driver something to aim for: the Dean Swift pub at 10 Gainsford Street, the Anchor Tap at 18 Horselydown Lane, the three-storey group around Brewery Square, and the warehouses of Jubilee Yard at 21–29 Queen Elizabeth Street, between Lafone Street and Curlew Street.

Many of these developments are built as perimeter blocks around an inner square or yard, so the kerb is on the outside and your front door may be across a courtyard on the inside. That adds carrying time, and we would rather know about it at quote stage than discover it on the day. Concierges, fob-controlled gates and booked lift slots are normal here. Our checklist for what to ask your managing agent before moving into a block is worth a read before you agree a date, especially if the building wants an insurance certificate or a refundable deposit for the lift.

Tower Bridge Road and the climb onto the bridge

Tower Bridge Road was laid out in the 1890s to carry traffic up onto the bridge, and the appraisal notes that it has to rise well above the surrounding ground to get there. The accumulator house, which once powered the lifting gear, and the listed Bridge Master’s House of 1906 both sit on that change of level between the bridge abutments and the riverside. The appraisal also describes narrow footways and heavy traffic along the east side of the road near the bridge. It is not a place to stop a removal van, and we do not plan to. We come in along Tooley Street and turn north into Horselydown Lane, Gainsford Street or one of the other side streets, and we tell you in advance which one, so you can meet the crew at the right corner.

Crossing the river: the weight limit and the bridge lifts

Plenty of moves from here go straight over the river, to the City, Wapping or Tower Hill. TfL’s list of river crossing restrictions gives Tower Bridge an 18-tonne weight limit, and our largest removal lorry is a 7.5-tonne vehicle, well under it. The same list shows London Bridge closed to general traffic from 07:00 to 19:00 on weekdays, so in working hours Tower Bridge is the obvious crossing for a van heading north. The bridge also lifts for ships, around 500 times a year according to its operator, and the times are published in advance. We check the lift schedule for your date, because a lift at the wrong moment can stop traffic on the approach just as the van is due.

Offices, studios and small businesses in the wharves

Southwark’s 2014 management plan for Shad Thames lists homes, small and medium-sized businesses, bars and restaurants, and cultural spaces side by side. Many of the warehouse buildings have workspace on the lower floors and flats above, so a business move here often shares a lift and an entrance with residents. We plan those for an evening or a weekend, agree the loading point and lift booking with the building in writing, and label every crate to a floor plan of the new space. Our office removals team handles the furniture and crates, and our IT relocation service takes down and reconnects the computers and network so the desks work on the first morning.

Art, antiques and pianos in loft flats

Big rooms with high ceilings attract big things: large framed prints, sculpture, glass tables, and the occasional grand piano. We crate or double-wrap artwork and glass, and we move pianos with a crew trained for them, checking first that the lift can take the weight. Our notes on packing and moving art and antiques in London cover how to photograph and list pieces before the day, which also helps with insurance. For everything else in the flat, our packing service can do the whole job or just the kitchen and the fragile things.

Smaller jobs and the gap between two homes

Not every job is a full flat. For a single sofa, a bed or a few boxes going to a friend in Bermondsey, a smaller van and two people is usually the cheapest way, and our man and van service is priced for exactly that. When the end of one tenancy and the start of the next do not line up, storage can hold the contents between the two and deliver them when you have the keys. All of Greater London is inside the ULEZ, and our note on how the ULEZ and the Congestion Charge apply to a moving van explains what a route through central London can add; whatever applies to your move is already in the fixed price.