Simon English
England Revisited

On a railway sleeper erected near coal mine + marshes 2 miles S.E. of Swillington.

On a stick put up on top the earth embankment pushed up round the west side of the now closed St Aidens opencast coal mine. The earth bank on which the post I used in 1971 stood has been moved about a bit over the years with shifting excavations.

The embankment runs along the east boundary of the workings. Along this runs a public footpath that runs downhill from the village, between the Lowther Lakes and across the footbridge over the River Aire. The public is discouraged from straying off this path and trespass on the mine by warning notices of danger and deep water. Physically this is defined by an 8 foot chain link fence with three strands of barbed wire on top. In spite of this in places the wire has been cut to gain access. In the main stretch of attack the fence is replaced with a 10 foot high wooden wall even this is compromised by lighting fires against it, which goes to show how hard it is today to keep out a determined young person.

Gaining permission to visit the site I can see that the old workings have been ‘landscaped’ flat and partially flooded, the rest has been grassed and in the distance the boundary is planted with young trees but no planting yet on the east embankment. Flocks of water fowl can be seen on the water and a few head of cattle graze the grass.

When I was here in 1971 all this was a working mine run by the coal board. However it was a bit of a problem site with the river bank being breached and flooding the site. During the miners strike it was closed as uneconomic. After privatization it was taken over by UK Coal who were able to win more coal before deciding to close it permanently.

One of the two colossal Walking Drag Lifts has been left on site rather than being scrapped. This is maintained by local enthusiasts with the aid of a lottery grant and can be occasionally visited by the public.

From the vantage point of point 27 one can see just how much this area has been changed by open cast coal mines. All the Lowther Lakes north and south of the river were once fields. Even the fields to the north appear to be Coal Board restored land. Truly coal extraction defines this area.

A man who knows this site, on looking at my old black and white photographs was able to see on the horizon the cooling towers of Ferry bridge power station. These are still there; however next to them he could see the gantry of the barge lift, a piece of engineering that lifted a barge and tipped the coal out rather than laboriously unloading it. Consumption of coal on a vast scale.

For the local community that once defined itself from employment in coal mining the future remains to be seen, as for the great expanse of St Aidens, well maybe it can become a bird sanctuary.
Point 27