Maintenance on the Green with White Bridge closed

Since the 1770s when the New Reach waterway was dug for wherry traffic, there has always been a bridge at White Bridge. Was the bridge just for foot traffic? No, it has always been wide enough to accommodate passage by whoever owned the land on either side to cross with a cart, horse and other land management equipment. The current bridge is the latest in that long, 250-year line of “accommodation” bridges.

 

The landowner on both sides is now Halesworth Millennium Green Trust, which is the charity that holds the land for the local community. The volunteers who maintain the Green for you need to be able to get across the New Reach with mowers and other tools to keep maintaining the paths so that you can use them. We also need to keep the habitats in good heart for wildlife by haymaking and other conservation work. No need for horses and carts nowadays, just mowers and fully laden wheelbarrows, but these are wider than simple foot traffic. So, the community needs White Bridge replaced like-for-like and we know that Suffolk County Council, who are responsible for the bridge, has embraced that need.

 

Meanwhile, with the bridge closed, and after such a warm and wet growing season, the volunteers know that everywhere on the Green is a bit more wild-and-woolly than usual. We’ll keep on doing what we can within the restrictions of not being able to cross the bridge with equipment and we look forward to the day when the closure of White Bridge is a distant memory.

 

Do keep letting us know of any exciting sightings.  Have a look at the website millenniumgreen.halesworth.net which carries news and information,  photos, wildlife records, history and geology. You can contact the Green directly on thegreen@halesworth.net  and, please only in an emergency, on 07743 772029.

 

Photo: Early photo of bridge at White Bridge crossing from the railway looking to Town