The phantom bridge

Monday 14 October

Change of scene today, still following the theme of clearing vegetation and preparing for the upcoming structural examinations. There were 5 of us today and with poor weather forecast, we quickly headed off to Bishops Cleeve to open up Bridge 41. This is the phantom bridge, we're not talking McDonnell Douglas F4 here, it's just an occupation bridge that is no longer used. It had the ends filled in some while back to prevent it becoming a congregating point for vandals. After doing the bridge and clearing 3 culverts, a start was made on recording the chambers along the drain run past Kayte Lane and Southam Lane to the racecourse.

Pecked Lane Crossing looking south, grass needs cutting

Making a start at Bridge 41

Bridge 41 up side

Under Bridge 41, signs of historic occupation in the troughs
(Photo: Alastair)

Dave digging out the down side to ventilate Bridge 41
(Photo: Alastair)

Culvert 41B, Roger appears from the weeds

Stuart heads south with the flail
(Photo: Alastair)

Culvert 41B up side chamber

Just a trickle at Culvert 41B up side

Culvert 41A down side, Dave in search of the headwall

Culvert 41A up side, Nigel takes the long way round

Culvert 40B down side, Roger looking for another headwall

Culvert 40B, part cleared

Culvert 40B down side, Roger raking clean

Culvert 41A down side

Culvert 41A down side headwall

Culvert 41A up side

Culvert 41A up side headwall, no sign of water

Culvert 41B down side, Alastair adds a paint mark to the post

Nigel heading round to Kayte Lane

Culvert 40B down side

Culvert 40B down side headwall

By lunchtime the rain had started to come in...

Lunch indoors today

Unusually for Monday there was a train running, Class 50 50035 Ark Royal was out on a charter as a thank you to the Class 50 Alliance who allowed the loco to visit for the summer.

50035 Ark Royal southbound

In the afternoon we went round to Southam Lane clearing the cess chambers on the way. If left they tend to get lost and then the robot flail knocks the lids off.

Bridge 42

Bridge 42 down side abutment, drain weeping

The cess drains run along each side from the end of the Cleeve straight to the racecourse, then they discharge into open ditches to run out to Culvert 42A.

Up side cess discharge point (Possibly)

Last up side chamber on the run

Pipe heading south out of the last chamber

Some of the chambers are easy to spot, luckily they are usually opposite each other as some are a bit more clandestine.

Down side cess chamber Southam, Lane

Up side cess chamber Southam Lane

Dave reveals another chamber

On the way past we cleared the double siphon at Kayte Lane (Culvert 41C). The stream runs in 2 pipes under the track to emerge on the up side.

Cuvlert 41C inlet

Culvert 41C down side

Cuvlert 41C down side outlet

As the siphon runs down under the track, it fouls the line of the cess drain. To get round this the cess is diverted to pass under the culvert outlet; this required 2 extra chambers to be added on the corners of the diversion.

Cess diversion chamber

Cess diversion chamber inside

This cess drain is one of the longer runs, with 34 catchpits on the up side and 32 on the down.

First up side chamber on the run

908m from the outlet

By this time the rain had become persistent, so we decided to head for home.

Cleeve Hill in the wet

Nigel, Roger, Dave and Alastair trudge back to the truck

On the way out we put some hazard fencing on Bridge 41 until such time as we can get back to cover the opening.

Bridge 41 up side

A not so quick stop off on the way back to look at Culvert 28A, it involved a detour to avoid the roadworks at Gretton 😞. The temporary fix we did a couple of weeks back, by adding rings and opening the hole where water was running out seems to have worked.