Thursday 10 January 2013

Footpath 22 - an update

One of Cranfield's more determined and knowledgeable rights of way activists has been in touch with Central Beds about Footpath 22. And he rightly raises an issue about "Bridleway 22". Hope Rightsofway Activist will share any update he receives from CBC with the  blog.


He states (to CBC):


I note that the remedial work on FP22 has apparently now been completed, having inspected it myself this morning. I have to say that although FP22 in that area is quite waterlogged, it is not really much worse than I have seen it during many of the last 10 winters. It usually dries out in early spring & remains dry until late autumn in my experience. I do gather that a dog-walker slipped and injured herself there before Christmas, it really requires good footwear to negotiate once it gets saturated though. The village side can be equally as bad after prolonged rain, that section of FP22 had parts 6 inches deep in water last year & was a welly job to get across.

I also note that the temporary FP22 path closure order notice has been removed from the RoW web pages but that the laminated placards are still in place at the FP22 entry points.

Sometimes these public notices are left in place long after they should have been removed. If you wish, I will volunteer to remove them tomorrow, saving your people a journey. Please let me know if you would like me to do this on your behalf.

Finally, there is a development proposal to build 135 houses straddling FP22 in Cranfield. This is being discussed at a committee meeting at CBC on the 17th January. 



In Page 5 the developers state:

"Provision of a cycleway providing a link to Bridleway 22 north of the development site."

I was unaware of any Bridleway 22 in Cranfield - have the developers made a mistake here & confused it with the footpath?  Clearly a cycleway attaching to a public footpath is not a valid action unless it is possible to upgrade an existing right-of-way from footpath to bridleway status? Possibly they did not consult the RoW team when they prepared the document?



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