Product Description

For anyone interested in green lanes, this handbook shows how to identify them on the ground, how to recognise them on antique maps and how to locate documents and other records which will reveal who used them in past times. Valerie Belsey also discusses their ecological value, the current controversy about who should be able to use them, and how to get involved in restoring and protecting lanes in your area. The book includes contact information, key dates in highway history and sample survey forms for recording wildlife in your local green lane.

Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #24367 in Books
• Published on: 2001-04-26
• Original language: English
• Number of items: 1
• Binding: Paperback
• 128 pages

From the Back Cover
This is the essential handbook for anyone interested in Britain's ancient network of green lanes. Valerie Belsey shows how you can identify them on the ground and recognise them on antique maps; and how you can locate documents and other records which will reveal who used them in past times. She also discusses their ecological value, the current controversy about who should be able to use them, and how to get involved in restoring and protecting lanes in your area. Discovering Green Lanes includes contact information, key dates in highway history and sample survey forms for recording wildlife in your local green lane.

About the Author
Valerie Belsey is a highway historian. Her first book on the subject of green lanes, The Green Lanes of England, which is primarily concerned with their history, is also still in print. She is also the author of Devon Roads and Cornwall Roads, as well as short stories, poems and plays on environmental topics.

Excerpted from Discovering Green Lanes by Valerie Belsey. Copyright © 2001. Reprinted by permission. All rights reserved
"The son of the athelings, then went over Steep stone-cliffs, straight passages, Single tracks, a road untrodden." -from Beowulf, the 8th century Anglo-Saxon epic poem It is this concept of the road untrodden, the road less travelled, the path not taken which is one of the most attractive aspects of using and researching green lanes. However, as soon as you wish to know more about them, you will turn to maps and be puzzled by the fact that very rarely will you find a lane actually called Green Lane. And if you do, it could be a complete misnomer in regard to the state that the lane is in today-for example the major road which runs through Palmers Green and down into Woodford in London. Matching what you find on the ground to what you find on a map can be testing. The simplest and most practical way to do this is to start from a map which is in print today. The main sources of maps are listed below. Ordnance Survey
At present the new Ordnance Survey (OS) 'Explorer' range of maps show unclassified country roads as 'other routes with public access'. They indicate routes that could be green lanes in the following ways:
on the 1:25000 maps, by green dots
on the 1:5000 maps, by magenta dots If you have traversed on the ground the line shown by green or magenta dots, you will know whether this Right of Way (RoW) is a green lane or not; there is no other way of finding out when using this series of maps. Hedgerows and surfaces are not indicated on them. You will have to go and explore whether or not the lane is bounded by hedgerows and has an unmade surface, in which case it fits the physical definition of a green lane. Some are already signposted with the various Rights of Way signs. If you're lucky, your adventure can go on a little longer, as everybody likes discovering an unsignposted road-it is indeed a discovery. (Refer to Chapter 5, 'Use Them or Lose Them', to find out more about categories of Public Rights of Way). If you are still checking for the status of the lane, then at this stage it would be advisable to go and look at the Definitive Map for your area, which is kept at your local County Hall. If you are not just checking for status, but are more interested in the historical value of a lane and wish to discover it on other maps, then this is the route you must take: stick with the Ordnance Survey maps. First, go in search of earlier editions either in your local library (in the Parish Boxes), Records Office or second-hand book shop, a Solicitor's Office, Estate Agent's Office, the Council Planning Office, the Highways Authority or the local Museum. When searching for these, you must choose your time to visit diplomatically. From my experience, it's true to say that the welcome you receive in these places will depend as much on the way the wind is blowing as on your attitude. You should remember that the fate of a footpath may be of importance to your village, but the maps on which it appears might also be needed urgently to sort out the location of broken culverts on a flood plain. Once you have located the maps, these are some of the editions where your green lane may appear as a Right of Way (ROW), track or white road:
The very early editions, known as Mudge's One Inch Maps (circa 1800).

The early OS two and a half inch maps in your area are a good place to start when searching for green lanes, as are the 6" OS maps, dating from the 1870s, which are always available in Records Offices.
On the OS 6" maps 1:10, 560 series, first produced in 1889, you will find all tracks and paths recorded as well as early Ecclesiastical and Civil boundaries.
After this there is the First Series of the 1:150,000 sheets. Remember that some green lanes are boundary lanes, and that boundaries do not appear on modern 1:50,000 ('Landranger') maps. The 1:25,000 ('Pathfinder') maps are useful for green lane tracking.

Customer Reviews

Not a guide for Off-Roaders
Right, this book is not written by a member of the Cobley family (LRO readers will know who I mean) and does not tell you good routes for weekend trips. However, it is well-researched by someone who is clearly very passionate about her subject. However, if it makes some of us 4x4 drivers and trailie riders a bit more appreciative of the world we're travelling through, it can't be a bad thing.