Mile End lock & cottage seen from Mile End Road. Regent's canal locks were built in pairs, each with a resident lock-keeper. These jobs were abolished when commercial traffic stopped, and one could only make passage during office hours on weekdays under BW supervision, because the locks had no by-washes to regulate water levels. In the 1970s one lock at each location was converted to a regulating weir so that boats could pass through the Regent's unsupervised and at any time. The buildings in the background are the student residences of Queen Mary University of London, my old College.