The Appeal of Mrs Toogood

Bypasses are odd things. I suppose as a pedestrian, I’m not really their target audience. To me, they feel like urban grumpiness made flesh/tarmac. They snake around cities that want to ward off gawkers and outsiders and are apparently prepared to pay hundreds of millions of pounds for the privilege. They’re not a modern phenomenon. In the 19^th century, a rail bypass was constructed around Lincoln and named the Lincoln Avoiding Loop which feels more of a brutalist, call a spade a spade type of name. I wonder how the locals felt about that.

Anyway, as of December 2020, the Lincoln East Bypass is up and running and has been receiving largely positive reviews from travellers and locals alike. Stretching about 5 miles from Wragby Road to Sleaford Road, it cost £122 million and took eight years. I’m not here to judge those numbers but for that sort of money you could probably get Chartwells to supply three if not four pandemic school meals. They might even throw in a yogurt for dessert.

Despite everyone else thinking it’s the best thing since sliced bread, I’d been furrowing my brow at the building work for the last year or so. However, I’m nothing if not fairminded and reasonable, so I thought that now it’s finished, I’d have a walk out to see it up close and personal. I picked a day at random, wrapped up unnecessarily warmly and set off.

The footpath bypasswards lay over the River Witham and I had two options for crossing it: the nearby No Pedestrian Access bridge and the slightly further away footbridge. For reasons still unknown to me, I plumped for laziness and trespass. I suppose it saved me at least four minutes’ walk. Now I don’t know who’s reading this: for all I know you might be a hardened criminal with a long history of walking on the wrong side of country lanes or riding your bike on deserted footpaths but for me even minor acts of rebellion give me the heebie-jeebies.

Watching elderly joggers sauntering across without so much as a care in the world did little to calm my nerves. Nevertheless, I girded my loins, considered my future jail survival options, and crossed over. It took about twenty seconds and no-one cared. I even passed a car heading the other way but the driver was just as oblivious to my presence as everyone else I meet.

I was over and free. Just yards away, the Sustrans route towards Boston offered me a brisk walk and a good eyeful of bypass. I’d walked this path several times before, but it’d never been this busy. Normally you don’t see a soul until you reach the turnoff to Washingborough a couple of miles away. Small clusters of walkers approached and drifted past towards the delights of lockdown Lincoln. I tried to smile nicely as they passed but I just don’t have a “smile nicely” kind of face. Mechanically I know what I’m doing but emotionally I’m all at sea.

Despite my gurning, several wanderers bunged me a cheery hello. I was having quite the pleasant trek by that point. I’m normally all in favour of not seeing anyone unknown or otherwise when I’m out but people were making an effort to be friendly. Maybe it was the sunshine or maybe just lockdown solidarity.

Whilst the path itself is still an uneven slab of pitted tarmac, the verges appeared to have been recently deforested, presumably in an attempt to deter dogpoo bag-hangers. It seemed to have worked but I’d honestly prefer more trees even at the cost of a resurgence in swinging faecal matter. I walked along trying to take some arty photos of swans on the river and a swift mile or so later I approached the bypass itself. The noise of traffic was at this point drowned out by a gurgling drain in the side canal busy leeching water from the fields. Presumably,, it would get louder as I walked the final few hundred yards.

The viaduct itself swings gently across the River Witham in a shallow concrete arc supported on concrete pillars. I tried communing with them but they had none of the warmth or imagined sentience of an ancient tree. I don’t think concrete hugging will take off any time soon.

I stood around for a few minutes under the bridge trying to decide what I thought of it. I think I eventually settled on a sort of shoulder shrugging indifference. There’s not much traffic on it at the moment but you’d struggle to hear even that. Instead, all you get is a sound like waves as the wind blows past the pre-rusted iron struts. Not gently lapping waves like you see on postcards but the teeth chattering jobs that hammer in off the North Sea when you’re wandering around near Mablethorpe wishing you’d hired a chalet.

True, it lacks the Age of Steam majesty of the old Victorian viaducts but some reseeded grass, a tasteful bush or two and a few benches and you might have a quirky picnic spot if we’re ever allowed to unwrap cellophaned sandwiches in public again.

There were already quite a lot of locals wandering around and having a gander. I watched as several of them decided to venture further along the path in the direction of Washingborough. I hope at least a few of them made it to the beautiful iron cow sculptures on the way to Five Mile Bridge near Fiskerton. They deserve to be seen.

The council have put footpath signs up at points along the trail anticipating local curiosity. Apparently, there’s been a competition or consultation or some such democratic exercise and what used to be called Sustrans Route 64 is now the Water Rail Way. Splitting railway into two words got my heckles up but a bit of late night internetting revealed that a Water Rail is actually a kind of bird that used to pass by these parts so I’ll let them off.

All in all, even though I’m a committed ruralist “modern life is rubbish” nutcase, there’s not much to object to in the viaduct or the bypass. Locals seem to like the peace and quiet and easier access to the city. Travellers like the time and stress it saves them on their journey. The viaduct makes no real difference to my walk and I guess birds will eventually be able to nest in its eaves (even though I’m not entirely sure bridges have eaves). The peripheral landscaping is still to be finished and there are some footbridges that currently lead nowhere. The local council are promising all kinds of developments around the bypass including new housing developments and jobs aplenty. That’s all very promising but surely if they extend the city to swallow up the bypass it won’t actually be a bypass any more. Maybe they’re hoping to get some more money for an outer bypass near Wragby. Suits me. That’ll be another blog post sorted.