SPENCEFIELD LANE – PROPOSED RE-SURFACING 

Readers and local residents who travel along Spencefield Lane may have noticed a City Council Highways surveyor, suitably clad in a yellow reflective jacket, marking out both sides of Spencefield Lane . I took time out to speak to him and he indicated that funds had been set aside for work to be done to re-lay the badly worn road surface. He told me that one of the local residents had informed him that the existing surface was originally laid in 1935. The present kerb stones were added some 10 years later by Italian prisoners of war. They used hand tools to make the kerbs from huge pieces of granite. The surveyor pointed out the crenellations, made by the POW's chipping away at the granite blocks. Some of the kerbs are up to 6 feet in length with a huge mass of granite hidden from view below the surface. The sheer size of these kerbs would make their removal and replacement a costly business, and for this reason they are unlikely to be replaced when the road surface is re-laid.

The surveyor will present his report and findings on the state of Spencefield Lane to the city council Highways Dept before the work is authorised. Let's hope that a new road surface is provided for Spencefield Lane on this much used route through the local area.

Melvyn Dines