Sunny meadow last Sunday afternoon. Alas, the field was mowed on
Monday morning as part of our meadow management regime.
The preserve over which I am steward contains the second (1817) and third (1840) oldest extant bridges in our county. They no longer bear traffic and have been incorporated into our trail system. This is a view of the second-oldest bridge, viewed upstream.
Unfortunately, age and torrential flooding have taken their toll over the years. In the early '90s, we invested over $60,000 in this bridge. Lately, we discovered that the footer for the pier standing in the creek is deteriorating and will have to be repaired.
In addition, graffiti vandals have "discovered" the bridge. For years, we had few problems with graffiti, but it's becoming more and more pervasive.
On the other hand, if you ignore the spray paint and the failing masonry, the view is still nice!
3 comments:
I thought I recognised the word Cynwyd in your previous post..... it is a village not too far from here!and I suspect is the origin for your rail trip name!!!
see
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cynwyd
as for the "old "bridge.....1840 isnt old! lol
you americans........there is a bridge near here that dates from the 1300s....
best wishes and hope you dont mind your leg being pulled
john
John: I was awaiting your abuse about our "old" bridge and you didn't let me down. (I hope you know that I'm kidding you.)
Thanks for the Wiki link to Cynwyd. Since the area wasn't named by the original settlers, but was christened nearly a century later, I could imagine someone taking a map of Wales, plopping down a finger, and choosing the closest community with an interesting-sounding name.
Beautiful old bridges. The engineering is remarkable. Too bad about the graffiti, but humans have been doing it ever since they became humans. In fact, we discovered recently that Homo Neanderthalensis was making art, too. Don't know why some people are surprised by this. Apparently they've never read William Golding's The Inheritors, where we learn that the wrong species (Homo Sapiens) won the battle to evolve into present times.
Post a Comment