Graeme has found a silver and diamond cross

Keith Bowden has published the working party schedule for 2008-9

http://www.horsellcommon.co.uk/volunteerworkpartieshc.htm

The fire brigade turned out on an unusual training session today, they watered the grass that's been seeded into the grasscrete lattice of the new car park at Monument Road. Green shoots are clearly visible, thanks Neil and Blue Watch at Woking Fire Station.

The July edition of our newsletter is available as a pdf.

TheCommon

I measure my year passing by things I regularly like to see on the common, from Nighjars to
leaf fall. One of the lesser known displays is the carpet of bog asphodel in Danewell Gutter
and they are full bloom.



When I see this plant later in the season in the upland moors and the highlands it looks
beautiful enough as a smattering across the moor but here it's almost garish, carpeting the
ground and just as pretty close up. An upbeat note to end on!

The bridleway from the common over Young Stroat Bridge to the island and then Chertsey Road  adjacent to Fairoaks Aerodrome was only formally recognised in about 1970 It runs over a piece of agricultural land that was a land swap in 1959. As such it has only been lightly surfaced. Being alongside the Bourne the water table is near the surface during the winter and some of Bridleway 2 has become very muddy. In co operation with Surrey County Council, the highway authority responsible for maintaining a right of way, and with approval from WBC, HCPS has engaged a contractor to do some improvements. You'll have to forgive the poor quality of my photo, my hands must have been shaking.



I decided to take a leaf from the previous road makers on the common and enhance it a bit. We have quite a few instances of raised tracks across the common, noticeable at grasslands opposite Viggory Lane, where the footpath has gradually migrated south of the original raised track. Traditionally the track was raised by taking soil from either side, to form ditches, and then adding this to the crown of the track, to raise it a bit. I've added a bit of strength  by incorporating a "pillow" of shingle inside a wrap of geo textile, this should allow water to freely percolate through without mud  getting mixed with the stone. As the area was all low lying we've taken some dredging spoil from alongside the Bourne to make a 150mm cover. We know we may have to add some stone or woodchip as a wear course but will wait and see how the 100m raised track fairs over the coming winter.

One of the reasons I'm keen on this type of approach is that the soil surface remains more natural and less urbanised than other approaches.

I'm expecting comments both good and bad!

We've had a lot of activity on the common this week, the big project is the new car park in Monument road. We were keen this car park should be maintenance free and as low an impact on the surroundings as possible. Now concrete isn't particularly environmentally friendly but this is a reinforced concrete lattice, so the whole area is not concrete. It is also porous and this caused a bit of debate but with advice from Natural England we plumped for a sub base material that wasn't going to significantly leach alkali metal ions onto adjacent acid heath soil, there was a large cost implication but in the absence of good data we agreed the normal sub base used locally, limestone type one MOT, wasn't worth the risk even though our granite sub base came from further afield.


Today Biker contractors poured the half of the concrete grid.