Tag: shenstone

March 9th – Somehow without noticing, I have managed to slip the camera into 16:9 widescreen aspect, which takes me back ten years to using my first Panasonic camera, the peculiar little DMC-LX2 which was native 16:9 widescreen. That camera was limited, but bombproof, and I used it for years. I never quite loved it, but we had a close relationship.

It had been a wet commute home from Shenstone Station, and having to call into Stonnall I took the backlanes. The accidental 16:9 really suited the atmosphere: Although pre-sunset, it was dark, foreboding and grim.

But mercifully, also warm.

Spring seems reluctant to reveal herself this year.

March 8th – Passing again from Shenstone in daylight, I stopped to take in The Little Holms, the western end of Shenstone’s Lammas Land, a public space that runs along the whole upper side of the village from rear the pumping station to the Birmingham Road, along the Footherley Brook.

This lovely spot gives a great view of the Victorian pump house, still in use with twin 200 horsepower electric pumps. With a storage reservoir underneath, this facility feeds Barr Beacon reservoir, and keeps Walsall and North Birmingham fed with clean water from it’s boreholes.

Brought into use in 1892, it pumps water from a 131 feet deep, 12 foot diameter well, with a 597 foot heading. The steam pump was retired in 1957, and now a 60 horsepower submersible well pump tops up a 10,000 gallon tank under the pumphouse.

After treatment there, water is pumped by 200 horsepower pumps up to Barr Beacon reservoir for distribution. These pumps can supply 1,500,000 gallons per day, and are backed up by emergency generators.

The cottages were originally for the workers, but I think they’re private now. I love the attic conversion in the end one – that gable wind is gorgeous.

March 7th – Returning via Shenstone, in the new-found evening commute dusk, I noticed that the tiny, log abandoned bungalow at Owletts Farm on Lynn Lane is now visible, before another summer’s leaf growth conceals it once more.

I don’t know why this tiny house, like several in the area is being allowed to decay, as I’m sure that before the rot set in it would have been a nice home for someone.

It has been empty as long as I’ve been cycling these lanes – nearly 40 years now.

A sad little tragedy.

February 25th – A day of continual light snow and odd sunny periods, but it was again fiercely bitter.

Returning from Shenstone Station, I stopped to note than in the daylight at last, my commute revealed the twin church towers of Shenstone – one in use, one very much derelict. 

Across the rooftops of the village, that’s a lovely sight and one that every year reminds me that although the weather may be bad, spring and warmth are on their way.

February 23rd – The mist had mostly cleared, but it was still very cold, and once more I found myself cycling back from Shentstone to Stonnall is the curious, netherworld twilight that’s neither day nor night that you get at this time of year.

I the cold and against a pretty sharp wind, the lights of the cottages and houses I passed were like soothing beacons in the gloom.

Passing through lower Stonnall my mind wandered to how many barn conversions and adapted houses there are here now: When I was a kid, they were working farms.

Such change.

February 18th – One of the stranger legacies of the M6 Toll motorway coming through the area has been the drainage and pollution control lagoons that dot the countryside at intervals along it’s route. 

I think the idea is that surface drainage from the road is taken into these pools which can be isolated during instances of pollution, like diesel spills. The lagoons themselves seem to overtop into local drainage, so they also provide a sediment settling function.

The one on Bullmoor Lane has matured well, and is, in summer, alive with wildlife. Secluded and rarely visited, it’s a little enclave of peace and tranquility. Only the sign by the roadside gives you any hint of what’s there.

February 18th – In what turned out to be an abortive, doomed ride due to technical and other issues, I was further dismayed to come upon this asbestos water tank, dumped in a lay-by on the bend of Bullmoor Lane near Chesterfield. 

As structural asbestos this is a health hazard and will require specialist removal and handling, unlike the monkeys who dumped it here.

If you’ve recently had a water tank like this removed, the people who did it may be flytippers with no respect for others. I hope their plumbing is of a higher standard than their waste practices.

I did report this online immediately.

January 23rd – And, as welcome as a warm pair of slippers, I return to Shenstone in the dark.

The Canon again did some good stuff with the atmosphere here. I am adoring this little camera. Never thought I’d say that of this brand.

It was cold, and there was a strong headwind. But I was homeward bound, and Shenstone Station, like an old pal, is soothing in the darkness.