Tag: Aldridge

#365daysofbiking Hello old friends

February 12th – One of the most reliable indicators of an ending winter are the daffodils on the corner of Wood Lane and Chester Road near the (soon to be closed) Wyevale garden centre.

Every year without fail they are the earliest patch of wild daffodils I see, usually appearing in the second or third week of February.

This morning, they were blooming bright yellow for my as I rode to the station, like old pals stand at the roadside to greet me.

Hello, old friends. Welcome back. Good to see you, and the springtime you bring. Looks like we both survived another long, dark winter.

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#365daysofbiking Bending the dark:

November 12th -I returned from Walsall via Aldridge and hopped on the canal there. There was a decent sky and conditions seemed quite still, and this view of an unusually quite marina was an interesting experiment from Northywood Bridge.

Must say the chemical plant nearby was smelling rather fresh. Glad I’m not moored here.

#365daysofbiking Some velvet morning:

October 10th – Seasons and situations have a habit of redeeming themselves. This chilly, but sunlit and misty dawn in Mill Green, on the the way to the station, I fell in love with autumn all over again.

Ever year I’m furious with it for stealing my summer, then it goes and does something beautiful to win me over.

I’m so glad I was around to see this.

365daysofbiking Decent, enough:

October 6th – From the wailing and gnashing of the NIMBYs of Aldridge, anyone would think that the block of apartments planned for the long derelict land right at the bottom of High Street on the Elms Island would be some monstrous, hideous carbuncle that didn’t fit with it’s surroundings at all.

Studying it closely while in the village of 26,000 on Saturday afternoon, I actually decided I quite liked it. I’m not fond of the flat roof, which is a cop out in design terms, but the rest of it is an interesting blend of textures and colours, and is actually quite bland, really. It’s not too big, it certainly doesn’t block light to the hHigh Street as some alleged and it seems a good match for the rather stark pub nearby.

I’m sure the elderly folk it’s built for will enjoy living close to the amenities of the ‘village’ centre, too, and it will help keep the local retailers busy.

It seems a decent thing to me.

#365daysofbiking Fixed in a Hole

August 31st -For the first time in years, I travelled down Hobs Hole Lane which runs from Aldridge down to the Chester Roa, and I’d forgotten just how beautiful the rolling countryside of Bourne Vale and Lazy Hill is.

I must get down here again soon. It’s a beautiful spot and we’re lucky to have it nearby, and I bet it’s lovely in autumn.

#365daysofbiking Springing up for autumn

August 31st – A welcome return with the damper weather has been the fungi, which has been mostly absent all through the dry summer.

I love to see toadstools and fungus in all it’s variety and this example on the towpath – some sort of Suillus I suspect – was glistening in the morning rain and was alive with bugs feasting on it.

#365daysofbiking Making a deposit

August 29th – I travelled home through Aldridge early in the afternoon after visiting the bank, and I had stuff to wait in for. On the way past the brickworks at Stubbers Green, just where the marlpit fence runs near the towpath, I noticed this curious instrument.

It’s a temporary placement, for gathering data about but deposition from the quarry and brickworks. It’s called – I kid you not – A frisbee deposition gauge, and it collects dust from the air and rain, which it collects in the vessel at the bottom of the tripod. There’s thin crosswires to stop birds landing on it, and a course foam pad to stop large debris like litter and leaves clogging it up.

Several of these instruments appear to be positioned around the site, presumably to test compliance with relevant pollution law.

It’s a fascinating area of environmental science and engineering and interesting to see it in use locally.

May 24th – It’s not often you see a proud swan momma doing the Hokey Cokey to entertain her cygnets, but it’s a longstanding tradition, in my head.

This wonderful sight of the mother watching over young, sleepy hatchlings was at Stubbers Green, mid-morning, and an absolute joy to the heart.

This pic was taken from the road, and the nest’s proximity to the traffic is my only worry.

May 8th – Without my camera which I stupidly left behind, grotty phone photos of a bait of embankment bolstering by the Canal and River Trust in Aldridge at Stubbers Green between the factory units on Brickyard Road that back on to the canal, and Lathams bridge.

There may well be an issue there, as there was in Walsall Wood a few years ago when the embankment on the same side was built up around the Black Cock and Coppice Road areas.

I wonder in they’re settling still or if this is just a safety margin thing?