Harden Hill Road is a lovely long,straight stretch of bridleway on a hill above Meltham. It has suffered from water damage for many years and despite the council’s occasional efforts to rectify this the problems remain. Much sandstone has been put on the bridleway to repair previous damage. This can look good at first but never really stays put. What the bridleway lacks is a drainage scheme to take water off it’s 1200m downhill descent. A considerable volume of water has a free run down the full length of the hill and predictably causes a great deal of damage. Most of the new sandstone surface now resides at the bottom of the hill and there are deep gullies forming on and off all the way down.
There are at least another 2 steep bridleways above Meltham which have been repaired using the same technique. They too are back to being deep and rather expensive gullies. It’s clear stoning up unmade public rights of way on these Pennine slopes is not a sustainable or cost effective method of repair.
Path Watch 
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