This green trail has been developed by South Swindon Parish over the last couple of years, initially it was intended to be trail starting at Shaftesbury Lake, by Richard Jefferies Museum, through Coate Water Country Park, along between the M4 and Broome Manor Golf Course, through Croft Wood, onto East Wichel, up to the old railway track, down to the canal by the Skew Bridge and across Kingshill Road along the old canal path to Cambria Bridge. The original trail as described was 5 miles long, it has now been extended to make it a circular route, going north of Shaftesbury Lake, towards Greenbridge, and then along the old canal towards the Magic Roundabout, along Fleming Way, through the Town Centre and to Cambria Bridge.
The whole route is about 13kilometres/ 8 miles, and makes a good tour of south Swindon, mostly off road. There are QR codes on waymarkers along the way, and there will be maps available very soon, along with comprehensive notes on the history of all sections. The route is completely accessible on foot, but how accessible on a bicycle and in a wheelchair? This was what I tried to establish by cycling along it with Cllr Jane Milner-Barry recently to check this out. The first thing to say is that it was difficult in places cycling along the paths when meeting pedestrians, mindful of this, we slowed down. I took a few photos of the route which looked fabulous on a cold, crisp and very sunny day a week ago.
We started at Croft Woods, because it was the nearest place to where we live, and travelled anticlockwise, ending up at the bottom of Croft Road a couple of hours later.
I'll start with this lovely view of Croft Woods:
and the first difficulty we encountered was from Pipers Way into Croft Wood, there is a pavement edge, this could be overcome by going up to the car park area opposite the entrance to Nationwide headquarters.
There is a smooth incline from the car park area onto the trail, we will have to check the width is OK for a wheelchair.
From Croft Woods we cycled along the much improved track beside the motorway, this used to be very boggy, several attempts have been made to gouge out the track and add lots of gravel as seen below. I found the gravel made riding a bicycle a bit of a bumpy ride, but it is fine for walking
Our next stop to look at the maps was when we had crossed Broome Manor Lane into Coate Water Country Park, should we have turned right at this point and go round the east side of the lake? The map indicated we should go straight across, fine on foot, but the other side of the lake would have been better on a bicycle because then you reach
Sustrans route 45 bicycle route on the other side of the park, away from the cafe and car parks.
Here's a view of Coate Water
a lovely view of Shaftesbury Lake from where we travelled along a lovely green corridor route
I didn't take any more photos until we reached the Cambria Bridge Community Gardens which are ready for planting up soon. Note: Cyclists deviate from the green trail suggested route when they reach Fleming Way, but that's fairly straightforward.
Next steps will be to transfer this information onto an accessibility map which, along with the other maps will be live on the parish website soon.
Meanwhile we have an official opening of the green trail on
Saturday 9 April, starting at 10am, we are still discussing how this should take place. I think the latest idea was to start at Shaftesbury Lake, but more details will be published under events and elsewhere nearer the time.
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