More about Lostways.....Yawn......Yawn.......Yawn.
It is just that I find them fascinating and that is from an intellectual standpoint, not necessarily "I am a campaigner" as some think I should be. If I were, I would not have the time to find more interesting anomalies and bore all and sundry with them
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There is in the north east corner of Shropshire a very large area without rights of way, it is just northwest of Market Drayton. This area seems to be centered on two estates, surrounding Clovely Hall and Shavington Park.
Exploring the area in the OS 1880 series, not easy because the maps for each county are separate and need to be joined together, I found this anomaly that can easily be seen on OS Explorer at SJ 66575 40511 and easily viewed in
Streetmap by copy and paste the map reference.
The map reference is the northern of two bridges over the Shropshire Union Canal.
The county boundary arches around in a northerly bulge centered on these bridges and along that arching part of the county boundary with a tangent of 0.78 mile, 3 rights of way from Cheshire terminate. One is the Canal towpath, unusually designated RoW but also a permissive way.
There is a surviving RoW, a bridleway, this goes through Hawksmoor Farm, now a heavily industrialized type of farm yard. (courtesy of Google Earth).
Looking at Google Earth a far more attractive route would be either of the 2 routes left off Shropshire's Definitive Map, but included by the Cheshire CC.
Can we blame anyone for this, might not have to look too far, Chairman of Shropshire County Council in the 1960's was one Heywood Lonsdale and he lived at Shavington Park.