Castle Mill Stream

Castle Mill Stream is a backwater of the River Thames in the west of Oxford, England. It is 5.5 km long.[1]

The stream leaves the main course of the River Thames at the south end of Port Meadow, immediately upstream of Medley Footbridge, split by the northern part of Fiddler’s Island to the west. It flows between Port Meadow to the north and Cripley Meadow (largely allotments) to the south. It then passes under the Cherwell Valley railway line and turns south, alongside the southern end of the Oxford Canal and the railway tracks, across which is the Castle Mill graduate housing development of the University of Oxford.

Further south, the Isis Lock gives access to the Oxford Canal, and the short Sheepwash Channel leads west under the railway tracks to the main stream of the Thames.[2] The stream then flows under Hythe Bridge, on Hythe Bridge Street, and under a series of bridges: Pacey’s Bridge on Park End Street, Quaking Bridge, and Swan Bridge (once known as Castle Bridge),[3] outside the original medieval city walls of Oxford, near Oxford Castle.[4] It continues under Oxpens Road and rejoins the Thames immediately upstream of the Gasworks Bridge.