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| Three out of four of the 60,800,000 residents of the United Kingdom live within two miles of the National Cycle Network. But during a recent visit to England the route I wanted to ride required me to ride my bike seven miles to catch a train, load the bike on the train, ride the train for 80 minutes (changing trains once en route), just to get to the trailhead. Only then did I begin my 2˝-hour bike ride. When the ride was over, my day continued with two more train rides and a final 40-minutes on the bike getting back to my cottage. Seems like a lot of trouble, when I could have easily stayed close to home and cycled local bike paths. But I had my reasons. Take the ride with me — you just might agree that “Bristol to Bath by Bike” is well worth the effort. |
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A TALE OF TWO CITIES (& TWO
RAILWAYS): |
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may well have known the town. Certainly documented Saxon
royalty, including Kings Offa, Alfred, and Edgar, knew the place well,
as did the Normans — who built Bath Abbey — and the Tudors — Henry VIII
had Bath Priory torn down, but gave the magnificent Abbey a reprieve —
and every royal household since. As much as any city in Britain, Bath is
associated first to art, architecture and aristocracy. |
| easiest available route. And, because Brunel was engineering a first-class line, the Great Western used cuts and tunnels to avoid the river’s many severe curves and remain as straight and level as possible. | |
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Twenty-eight years later, on the scenic and hilly north side of the River Avon the last spike was hammered in place on a new railway spur connecting Bath with the Midland Railway’s Bristol and Gloucester Railway (B&GR) at Mangotsfield, approximately halfway between Bristol and Bath. The new ten miles of track (the Mangotsfield & Bath Branch Line—MB) made through passenger rail services possible to England’s south coast resort of Bournemouth from Bristol, Gloucester, Birmingham and points north. But, when the line opened in 1869, it also provided Bath to Bristol passenger trains serving villages and towns on the north side of the Avon. The line used the big Temple Meads Station in downtown Bristol, where it interchanged with the |
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| GWR, as its western terminus. However, its eastern terminus was at Bath’s Queen Square (later Green Park) Station, about one-half mile west of the GWR’s Bath Spa Station, and there was no interchange of passengers between the two lines in Bath. Since London passengers could not easily reach the MB’s Green Park Station, the MB missed out on a considerable source of traffic. And, because the line’s route was both rugged and roundabout, train times between Bath and Avon were slower than on the competing Great Western mainline. | |
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Nevertheless, the Midland Railway (MR) route from Bath to its junction with the B&GR at Mangotsfield operated for 100 years. In the late 1960s, the line closed, except for a short spur inside Bath city limits. Bristol and Bath grew, and suburban communities expanded outwards from both cities. In 1972 the tracks on the line were taken up. That same year a local group formed to reclaim the Bath-Bristol route for use as a possible commuter rail route and as a nostalgic steam tourist line on weekends, centered on the rural Bitton station 2/3 of the way to Bath. Before the end of the year, the tracks began to be put back in |
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place. By 1979 trains were again running on a portion of the MB, but not commuter trains. The line was reborn as the Avon Valley Railway (AVR), which runs nostalgic steam trains on an isolated section of the MB spur centered at Bitton station. Over 100,000 tourists come to ride the AVR annually (operations: March through December). Currently the AVR offers six-mile round-trips east (& downhill toward Bath) from Oldland Common station past Bitton station to a point just beyond the first (of six original) bridges across the Avon. |
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 BIRTH
OF A NOTION Also in 1979, another local group calling itself Sustrans, Britain’s national pro-bike (and walking and any other healthy, environmentally friendly form of SUStainable TRANSport) foundation, opened the first portion of its first major cycle route on a dedicated, paved cyclepath/walkway. The public access (& handicapped accessible) route follows or replaces the former combined B&GR + MB railway branches for the 17 traffic-free miles between Bristol and Bath. The route, completed in 1984 and called the Bristol and Bath Railway Path, is an |
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extraordinary
success, with heavy usage in at either end of the line within the cities
and suburbs of it namesake cities. The middle section of the route is
less heavily used, except around the
AVR
tourist railway at trains times and close to the towns of Staple Hill,
Mangotsfield, and Warmley. The asphalt path is well maintained. Most of
the time the route is 3 meters (about 10 feet) wide, wider than Brunel’s
competing
GWR,
and wide enough to permit easy passing of pedestrians and other cycles.
There are some bridges and crossings that are narrower, and one area
where horses are also permitting on the path. |
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National Route 4, the marked cycle path that runs east across Britain from St. David’s in southwestern Wales to London crosses through some of Britain’s most beautiful rural landscapes, and through some of its most congested conurbations. Since 1979 the Sustrans bike path system has grown to become the National Cycle Network: 10,000+ miles of pathways marked, mapped, and maintained for cyclists, walkers, commuters, school children, and most anybody who likes the out-of-doors. There are bike routes almost everywhere in Britain and Northern Ireland. |
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| For me to be in the UK with a bicycle is to be a kid in a candy store. Like a two-wheeled Edna St. Vincent Millay, there isn’t a cycle route I wouldn’t take, no matter where it’s going. But, this piece of Route 4 is something special — the historical prototype that changed a daring notion into a nationwide reality. | |
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Bristol and
Bath are easily reached as a day trip from |
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