A HEREFORDSHIRE writer has produced a website showcasing some of the best walks on old railway lines in Herefordshire.

Garth Lawson has put together a list of walks that formed part of an archive consisting of nearly 150 routes in and around Herefordshire.

These walks appeared every month for more than 12 years in the Hereford Times.

One of these walks plots an four and a half mile route circular route around the Herefordshire hamlets of Backney Bridge and Foy.

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Backney Common, Strangford and the hamlet of Foy are perched on a strip of land which reaches out into one of the most winding stretches of the twisting river.

The walk starts off in Foy and embarks on an extravagant S-shaped journey around the river.

Because of the winding nature of the river it was deemed necessary to install three bridges in the space of three miles.

Each of them, at Ballingham, Strangford and Backney had consisted of five tall masonry piers and six spans, originally of timber.

The middle pier of the middle bridge at Strangford collapsed in a flood in 1947 about ten minutes after a goods train passed over it.

When steam travel was at its height, seven trains a day were passing through the valley.

The fourteen remaining piers still stand at the three crossings of the river, though shorn of their trusses after Dr Beeching put paid to the line in 1965.

The country lane route from the old Backney Halt rises very gently to an airy open walk beyond Strangford Farm and walkers cross the line of the old railway.

Back up at Brick End, in Foy directly above the bridge, Peter, now Baron Mandelson of Foy spent many of his weekends in the 1980s entertaining guests such as Mo Mowlam and Tony Blair.

For more information on this walk and to download a pdf of the route please visit http://www.herefordrailwaywalks.co.uk/three.html