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Interpretation
The Old Cattle Yard and Gateway Sculpture
Future Aims
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The Old Cattle Yard and Gateway Sculpture
Location: Suffolk
The original application included the following planned work:
· hedge lining of the path leading to the Cattle yard
· tree pollarding
· access steps repair
· bollarding of the wildflower bank area.
· transformation of the cattle yard as a picnic site
The hedge planting proved to be significantly more difficult than we had anticipated!! In the previous year, the path to and through the cattle-yard had been turned into a cycle-track with Sustran’s help and County Council funding. It is now part of the Cycle Route from Felixstowe to Oxford. In building this tarmac cycle-track the contractors had dumped all the hard-core to the sides of the pathway exactly where the hedge was to be laid.
A significant number of volunteer days went into trying to get the hedge row planted. Eventually Greenways hired a mini-digger and imported a lot of top soil onto the site in order to get a good foundation for the hedge whips.
Tree pollarding was done by a tree surgeon.
The access steps needed additional work to divert rain water which was causing the damage. Some steps were rebuilt by Ipswich Borough Works and a new hand rail installed.
The bollards were to prevent cars at Ipswich Town football games illegally parking on the wild-flower area which is by the side of the road. A sub-contractor was hired on a daily basis to put the bollards in. After a day or two only a hand full of posts had been put in and hence an alternative strategy was sought by Greenways. They decided to use their own volunteers under close supervision. The volunteers worked hard on this job and completed it. Full service searches were carried out and all came back with “nil returns” which was a bit surprising as we anticipated there to be services. Despite care and caution a fibre cable was hit but no damages were sought as the supplier had given a nil return. Ipswich Borough Council decided to extend the bollards with their own funding to include areas of grass adjacent to the car park next to the work that we carried out.
The cattleyard area was cleared by Greenways and members of Ipswich Wildlife Group. A layer of soil had built up and all that was necessary was to remove this. This is probably one of the easier tasks as we had thought that we would need to relay paving. A lot of the old railings that had been cut down were found on site and these were welded back into position. Some railway sleepers were also used to form benches to sit upon. These are in keeping with the area as it was a cattle yard/sidings.
During clearance of the overgrowth for the hedge some of the old rails were found as well as the base of a goods wagon – was this the place the goods yard man slept when he waited for late trains as we found recorded in local history books?
The Gateway sculpture
The original concept of a gateway arch was commissioned with a design brief. However the result was that a very flimsy looking arch was all that could be provided within the budget. It was also thought that it would be an ideal structure for children to swing upon and damage! This (charged) commission was therefore abandoned and an alternative solution sought.
With support of IpArt a local artist was approached and his ideas examined. He was able to provide a bronze statue of a river boatman. His original sketches did get a lot of negative press – looking more like a spider but the final article is excellent and depicts a man rowing across the tide. The River Action Group also had the opportunity to witness the “birth” of this river man by going to the artists studio and seeing the pouring of the molten bronze into the casing and it being cracked open! He also explained how he had made patterns in the arms by using local reeds which burnt to form the sinews in its muscles.
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