The Lavant Runs Again...

12th January 2016 - Wind still westerly, but feeling very chilly in it, especially when cloudy / dark. Bright morning before clouding over around midday.

The Lavant re-emerges - Chichester south

Went to Chichester specially to see the Lavant, now flowing well after a late reappearance this winter. It was racing out of the culvert under South Street as if glad to see daylight again after its banishment beneath the city streets, the channel here still relatively confined. Plenty of water in all the diverging, constrained channels on the south side of the A259, too. It wasn't as high as it had been this time in 2013 or 2014. Water in the channel south of the cathedral and city wall probably about a foot deep.

I don't know exactly it returned, but a month ago it was still dry. What a change in a relatively short space of time. Last week the EA River & Sea Level’s page (Southeast – Solent and  South Downs, Graylingwell) indicated it was more than high enough to flood. The turn around has happened not just onthe Lavant, but also on rivers throughout southern and lowland England.

When I got home, I ordered some new wellies online (Blacks): a drought of wellies in the shops after winter sales and the general swampy-ness everywhere right now. After a succession of wet winters and our general area being especially bad for mud, l tend to wear through wellies fairly quickly (three pairs in as many years). Also walk longer distances in them the typical welly wearer might. My walk out and back to East Lavant confirmed they were no longer up to the job. Though no visible splits or holes in the soles or join with the sole, water still getting in somewhere when I tried walking through puddles, making my socks damp. Soles don't tend to be very thick either, meaning uncomfortable when walking along rougher, more flinty paths. /This was even though l avoided the soggiest / boggiest bits, by walking in /out of the city mainly along pavements to Brandy Hole Copse and then along the Centurion Way to Lavant.

A Centurion along the Centurion Way

At East Lavant, alongside Sheepwash Lane, again, not as high as it was 2 years ago, when it was brimming over. Now well within bank but fairly high beneath some of the brick footbridges leading to / from the houses along the lane and the bridleway north towards The Trundle.

East Lavant

Did a few sketches along the way;  because of the cold, I had to keep them fairly quick: hence pencil only south of the city wall, looking westwards along the path here to a red brick bridge. Along the Centurion Way, in the open area around the “amphitheatre” one of the “Centurions”, viewed looking north along the path to where it went under a road bridge. A pole in the centurion’s left hand. He’d also acquired a scarf (handkerchief), removed by the time I came back this way. Then, thirdly, looking along the Lavant from the road bridge at the east end of Sheepwash Lane, for comparison with the one I did here a month ago when the channel was dry.

East Lavant - 12th December 2015

East Lavant - 12th January 2016

After packed lunch on a bench on the edge of the green, as sheltered as possible here, tried walking along the bridleway across Sheepwash Lane alongside Staple House Farm. Once again, only got so far, because wellies weren’t up to the petite crue (puddle) with no way round either side.

The big downer / feel awful factor hanging over the Lavant - the stream and the village is the prospect of having a thundering expressway rammed through it (revving up the A27 /Chichester northern bypass. Blogged about this last month. A downer certainly for someone like me who has become very attached to this place, as intermittent as the Lavant may be. There are no firm proposals or decisions yet on possible options, however a northern bypass is one of them. As at Arundel, there are people who seemingly hell bent on going for the most environmentally destructive option. It would be far more sensible to improve the pre-existing dual carriageway to the south of the city instead of intrude into the South Downs National Park and wreck the relative peace and quiet to the north of the city. East Lavant would, at the very least be have considerable traffic noise and poorer air quality inflicted upon it, even if  they road lay out in the village was left much as it is now. It is great, too, to be able to walk out from the centre of Chichester to the South Downs without having to negotiate a potentially dangerous road crossing. Anyone who has walked the ridge of the Downs via the South Downs Way or Monarch’s Way will know that there is a tricky road crossing  about every ten miles, if that.  As is the case when attempting to walk out to Chichester Harbour from the city centre.

These are the first few key facts, pasted from the Chichester Deserves Better homepage:

• Highways England are considering 6 options to improve congestion on the A27 around Chichester.
• 4 options are improvements or upgrades to the existing route.
• 2 options are a northern bypass that will pass through Fishbourne, West Broyle, Lavant, Goodwood, Strettingon and Boxgrove.
• It has been confirmed that the bypass will be an Expressway meaning it will be a dual carriageway with national speed limits.
• The route would run along the boundary of the South Downs National Park causing irreversible damage.