Who we are
Surge Cooperative is a not-for-profit cooperative living and working on the Channelsea River in Newham,
East London, since 2018. We are a community of boaters, ecologists, artists, and local residents united by a shared
love of the river — and a conviction that it can once again become a thriving, biodiverse, community-centred waterway.
Our aim is to co-develop the Channelsea River and Bow Creek as a liveable, cohesive, resilient, and participatory blue-green space.
We work toward this through affordable, climate-adaptable cooperative moorings; environmental restoration; and outdoor community education.
We operate against the backdrop of a legacy of industrialisation and environmental degradation, the pressures of rapid commercial
development, and the challenges facing two of the UK's most economically deprived boroughs. We think the river deserves better —
and so do the communities that live alongside it.
Al
An acoustics engineer with an experimental arts background, Al has been living and working on barges for over 20 years. A passionate advocate for waterways, he brings a wealth of knowledge to the cooperative as a Principle Six co-op advisor.
Ana
A photographer, retoucher, and co-owner of Aly Studios. A Day Skipper-qualified boater with a sharp eye for the river in all its moods.
Charlie
A Renewable Energy Co-operative member and solar-powered boater, bringing practical know-how to sustainable living on the water. Co-secretary of Surge.
Hannah
Has a long history of working in creative events production both in the UK and internationally, curating public events and workshops with a diverse network of arts organisations and charities.
Michal
A sound designer and engineer with broad technical skills spanning landscape, carpentry, and computer-based production. Co-founder of Animorph Co-op and CASH, and a Day Skipper-qualified boater. Co-secretary of Surge.
Ruth
A designer and photographer who has lived and worked on boats for over 20 years. She carries out monthly water quality testing on the Channelsea, keeping a close eye on the river's health through the seasons.
Stephen
Is an artist working to transform spaces and communities using various disciplines including gardening, sculpture and music. He's very good at getting people together and inspiring them to make a change.
Our cooperative model
Surge's moorings are organised as a fully mutual cooperative, where members become stakeholders with an equal voice.
All decisions prioritise care for people and the environment, and any surplus is fairly shared and reinvested in the community.
Thames Water has offered us a 125-year lease to turn a strip of land adjacent to the water into access for our first moorings.
Across the river, along the Long Wall Path, we have a yearly roll-over stewardship lease with Thames Water, where we
are developing an ecology garden, a community orchard, and an accessible compost toilet.
Our history on the River
The area surrounding Bow Creek and the Channelsea River was mostly developed during the latter part of the nineteenth century.
Proximity to the River Lea — a tributary of the Thames — made it an ideal location for industrial expansion. A large number of wharves,
chemical works, metal works, and factories once lined the river. At its peak, over 40 bustling wharves stretched along just a few miles
of the tidal River Lea, with hundreds of vessels mooring alongside.
Today, only a handful of boats remain. We are working to change that — reviving the river's heritage
as a working, living waterway, now in service of community and ecology rather than industry.
Conservation work
The Eco Boat
In 2025–26, we ran a successful community crowdfunding campaign to purchase our Eco Boat — made possible thanks to the generous support of the Inland Waterways Association and the Aspers Foundation, as well as donations from our wider community. The boat is now in the water and being fitted with an electric outboard and batteries.
The Eco Boat is essential to our conservation work. We use it to tackle invasive species — primarily Himalayan Balsam and Floating Pennywort — which spread rapidly and choke the river, threatening its wildlife. Manual removal and composting is one of the most effective methods for managing these species, and having a boat enables us to reach areas that are otherwise inaccessible.
The Long Wall Ecology Garden
Along the Long Wall Path on the banks of the Channelsea, we are creating an ecology garden and community orchard. Over the years, volunteers have helped us clear over 128 bags of rubbish, plant trees, bulbs and wildflowers, build wildlife habitats, and install a living dead hedge for fungi, lichens and invertebrates.
Floating Islands
We designed and built our first floating island — a 'liver for the river' — in 2019, providing resting spots for birds and invertebrate habitat, with aquatic planting for water filtration. In 2022, supported by £9,000 from the Newham Co-create Community Assembly Fund, we built five further floating habitats for the Channelsea River, with community workshops at every stage.
River Clean-Ups
As a trained Thames21 River Action Group, we have been organising regular river clean-ups since 2018. Across 15 clean-up events, 43 volunteers have helped us remove over 6 tonnes of rubbish from the river.
Community engagement
We believe the river belongs to everyone. Since 2018, Surge has engaged over 264 local people in a range of cultural and environmental activities, with partners including Thames21, Loughborough University, Queen Mary University, Totally Thames Festival, Newham Heritage Month, Sound Camp, East London Garden Society, Culpeper Community Garden, Plaistow Eco Hub, Abbey Gardens, Compost Mentis, The Orchard Project, River Roding Trust, National Parks City, Newham Nature Network and Creekside Discovery Centre.
Monthly Eco Gatherings
Every first Saturday of the month, 11am–1pm, we gather at the Long Wall Ecology Garden
for hands-on conservation work, river observation, wildlife spotting, cake, and community.
All are welcome and events are free.
Art and culture
We have collaborated with artists and cultural organisations to bring the river alive in new ways. Projects have included:
The Bend in the River is My Home — two artist films, a guide to bug hotel making, historic photos, a soundscape composition, and a compilation of historic local mooring bollards, created for Newham Heritage Month 2020.
An Ear to the River — a live audio stream from above and below the Channelsea River for Totally Thames 2020.
Contributions to inspiralLondon's 'Hydracity' exhibition at ThamesSide Studios, part of the Thames Festival Trust.
River rights and advocacy
We are actively working to give the Channelsea River a legal voice. In collaboration with the River Rights Network and the Climate Ecological Transitions Hub at Loughborough University London, we are developing a River Rights Charter for the Channelsea — exploring what it would mean for Newham to join the 17 UK councils that have already recognised local rivers as having rights under the law.
We are also engaged in broader advocacy for moorings and waterway access, including contributing to an All-Party Parliamentary Group discussion, advising other boating cooperatives, and participating in planning discussions about the future of East London's waterways.
Legal status and stewardship
Surge Cooperative Limited is registered with the FCA (no. 4485). Following a two-year legal dispute with the Port of London Authority over the ownership of the riverbed, we settled out of court with a Tomlin Order. This opened the door to a shared stewardship model for the Channelsea — similar to a Community Land Trust — involving the Port of London Authority, London Borough of Tower Hamlets,
London Borough of Newham, and the Canal & Rivers Trust.
Our supporters & Partnerships
We are grateful for the support of organisations who share our vision for the river:
Thames Water · Thames21 · Power to Change · Community Led Housing London · Groundwork · Inland Waterways Association · Newham Heritage · London Nature Trails · National Parks City · Co-operatives UK · Aspers Foundation · London Borough of Newham · London Borough of Tower Hamlets
We are also happy to have worked with Loughborough University and Queen Mary University of London, whose researchers and students have brought scientific rigour and fresh energy to our river monitoring and habitat work. We work with the River Lea Catchment Partnership, sharing data and attending Lea Guardians meetings as part of the wider effort to improve the health of the Lea catchment. We are also working with the Cody Dock/Living Lea project on catchment-wide river health data and Compost Mentis, a soil and alternative sanitation cooperative, on community build days and ecological sanitation on site.
Funding and Support
Our work has been made possible by generous funding from a range of sources. In 2019, a £14,959 Bright Ideas grant from Groundwork, funded by Power to Change and the Ministry of Housing, Communities & Local Government, helped us lay the foundations of the cooperative — covering governance, legal structures, moorings development, river clean-up events, and our first floating island installation in partnership with Biomatrix Water. That same year, Thames Water provided £12,000 in early support for our on-site work.
A £59,900 grant from Community Led Housing London — a programme supported by the Mayor of London and hosted by CDS Co-operatives — was instrumental in developing Surge as a viable cooperative enterprise. The funding supported business planning and mentoring, topographical and drone surveys across four potential sites, specialist marine legal advice and barrister's opinion on riverbed ownership and ancient mooring rights, architect and planning fees, insurance, and training for our members. This foundational work gave us the legal, structural, and spatial grounding to pursue our long-term vision for community stewardship of the Channelsea corridor.
In 2021, a £30,000 Mayor of London Grow Back Greener grant transformed the Long Wall Ecology Garden. Working with the Orchard Project on consultation and community planting, and with surveyors Russell Miller and Nick Bertrand and landscape designer Kaia Wells, we planted an orchard and a bank of willow along the riverside. The grant also funded a solar-operated water pump drawing and filtering water directly from the river to irrigate the garden, and a more robust composting toilet for volunteer days and events.
Newham Community Assembly has supported us through two Community Infrastructure Levy grants — £9,875 in 2021 and £18,680 in 2022 — enabling us to deepen our roots in the local community. In 2023, a £5,000 Our Space award from Groundwork and the GLA allowed us to develop a conservation plan for the Long Wall Ecology Garden with Nick Bertrand of the Creekside Discovery Centre, build a composting system on land, and construct a raft to begin tackling the floating pennywort building up on the river. A further £2,500 from Thames Water supported our ongoing site work that year.
Also in 2023, a £6,777 grant from the Mercers' Company enabled us to continue our partnership with Compost Mentis and our volunteer community, gathering recycled materials and running community build days to install a temporary composting toilet on site.
We have been grateful for the support of the previous Mayor of Newham, Rokhsana Fiaz, and of Laurence Pinturault, formerly of Newham Council and Tower Hamlets, whose work on the Lower Lea strategic infrastructure programme brought valuable context and encouragement to our aims. The Heritage Lottery Fund, through Newham Heritage Month, funded a community project celebrating the natural and industrial heritage of the area. We were also invited to present to Future of London on cooperative moorings, waterways heritage, and community stewardship — an audience that included Canal & Rivers Trust and other key waterway stakeholders.
We are proud members of the Lea Valley Heritage Alliance and the Inland Waterways Association, and we are building a growing network of local supporters including Channelsea House residents, Newham Community Garden Forum, Plaistow Eco Hub, the Greenway Litter Pickers, Carpenter and Docklands Centre, and Bow Locks Cooperative Moorings.
We are also working with Sophie Groak of Totally Thames on a creative event for the festival — a collaboration that reflects our belief that the river is not just an ecological resource but a living part of the city's culture and identity.
Get involved
There are many ways to support our work:
• Come to a gathering — first Saturday of the month, 11am–1pm, free
• Volunteer — river clean-ups, planting days, and conservation work throughout the year
• Follow us on Instagram and Facebook for updates
• Get in touch — contact us here