Talk:The Broomway

Picture

This article would greatly benefit from a picture of one or two brooms, to give an indication of their appearance. Are any still in situ - or does anybody out there have any open-source pictures they could upload? ~dom Kaos~ (talk) 13:19, 4 August 2014 (UTC)

The brooms are no longer there and I suspect they've been gone for at least a century. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.114.146.117 (talk) 05:19, 16 January 2017 (UTC)

I have found a public domain article which has a (poorly reproduced) photo of the Broomway including some of the brooms, dating from the early 20th century. The brooms were surprisingly small and squat, with what looked a small, foot-high bundle of twigs sticking out of the mud. I'll try and add a copy soon.

I've seen written evidence that a few brooms were still in situ around 1940 Svejk74 (talk) 21:41, 8 February 2017 (UTC)

Picture now added.Svejk74 (talk) 14:54, 9 February 2017 (UTC)

Why?

It's fascinating that this dangerous, soggy way was ever considered a viable route to Foulness, and that anyone would choose it (as opposed to, say, taking a rowboat the short distance across Havengore Creek), let alone expend resources on the construction of the six headways. What were they thinking? GPS Pilot (talk) 08:29, 1 November 2014 (UTC)

Another why: Why didn't the track hug the high-tide mark more? Surely that would have been a lot safer? Also, after the split of the creek, both branches are at points less than 50 m wide. That's still a lot, and building a wooden footbridge would have been expensive... but they managed to find the resources to build the headways. Or they could have installed a rope-guided foot ferry. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 80.114.146.117 (talk) 05:01, 16 January 2017 (UTC)

Much of the farmland on Foulness was reclaimed from marshland in the 16th-18th century, so the flat, firm sand of the Broomway would have actually been a better passage. There's also a school of thought that it's a route dating from a time before mediaeval storm surges inundated a lot of the coastline.

Another thing to remember is that while the whole 'dangerous' angle is foregrounded in modern articles (and indeed the Broomway is now very dangerous indeed for the average person without a guide, particularly as the brooms have now gone), for pre 1920s residents of Foulness the sands were an everyday part of their lives - they set up fish traps on them, travelled back and forth on them etc, even at night. They had a very high level of knowledge and respect and in this context the Broomway was an entirely practical route compared to trying to get a cart and horse through miles of marshland.

As for why the track didn't hug the shore, it's because there was softer mud there. Svejk74 (talk) 21:52, 8 February 2017 (UTC)

© ??

The photo loaded in Wikimedia should not be copyrigthed ? --Pascal Boulerie (talk) 16:08, 11 January 2017 (UTC)

The photo attributed to an individual has now been replaced by a better one from Geograph.Svejk74 (talk) 14:58, 9 February 2017 (UTC)