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| A distant view of Bradgate Quarry |
By the time that I finished having a quick look at Masbrough Cemetery, I had been walking for 4 hours and had covered a distance of 8 km and I could easily have decided to stop for the day, having encountered some interesting geology at Thundercliffe Grange quarries, Ockley Bottom and Grange Moor Quarry and had a good look at the building stones of Kimberworth.
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| My exploration of Kimberworth |
Crossing over Kimberworth Road to the entrance of Bradgate Park, however, I caught sight of the large disused Bradgate Quarry on Wortley Road in the distance, which I had tried to gain access to back in 1996, when I was undertaking surveys of the potential RIGS (Regionally Important Geological Sites) in South Yorkshire.
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| A view across Bradgate Park to Bradgate Quarry |
At that time, I was refused permission in no uncertain terms by the occupiers, who operated a car salvage, dismantlement and spares business and so I didn’t get to see this extensive exposure of the Parkgate Rock, which the 1947 memoir describes as a 'fairly massive fine grained sandstone – exposed over a section of 35 feet and possessing small faults and red staining in places'.
Resigning myself to the fact that I still hadn’t been able to get to see an outcrop of the Parkgate Rock, I just took a few photos of the rock face that I could see with the zoom lens on my Canon Powershot G16 camera and headed down Wortley Road.
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| An exposure of the Parkgate Rock at Bradgate Quarry |
Before catching the bus back to Rotherham, I finished my exploration of the geology of the north-west part of Rotherham by having a look at Bradgate Brickworks, a geological Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI) that I had visited on a couple of occasions, when the South Yorkshire RIGS Group was still active.
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| The geological section at Bradgate Brickworks |
Designated in 1988, it is considered to be the best available exposure of strata lying immediately above the Clay Cross Marine Band (= Vanderbeckei Marine Band, Westphalian B – Middle Carboniferous) in the Pennine coalfields. The marine band itself is poorly exposed here, but 30 or so metres of overlying non-marine sediments have been recorded – including the Lidgett Coal Seam, a useful marker horizon which occurs over a wide area.
I can’t remember exactly when I last visited but, although the old quarry face was fronted by an area of scrubland where there were occasional dumped cars, it was easy enough to gain access. On this occasion, I discovered that a small housing estate had been built on the southern part of the site, with boundary fences now stopping general access there.
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| The overgrown quarry face behind the Leatham Avenue housing estate |
Carrying up Fenton Road to another part of the site, where I could previously see coal seams in the quarry face from the roadside, I was a bit disconcerted to find that the whole area was covered in hawthorns, which I thought may have been planted to deter visitors.
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| An impenetrable growth of hawthons at Bradgate Brickworks |
Not being able to see the old quarry face any longer, I made my way up along the northern edge of the quarry to see what I could find and, after stopping to look down at a seemingly impenetrable mass of trees and bushes, I came to a place where I could just make out a coal seam that was not yet obscured by the saplings growing on the lower slopes.
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| A glimpse of a coal seam at Bradgate Brickworks |
I have since learned that, in November 2001, Rotherham MBC had expressed concern that overgrown vegetation presented a risk to the geological features of the quarry face and proposed that the site be bought and managed by them, but it appears that this didn't happen.
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| A coal seam at Bradgate Brickworks |
As the Chairman and the principal surveyor for the South Yorkshire RIGS Group at this time, I hadn’t been made aware of this at the time but, as I have seen at Boston Park and Maltby Crags, the conservation of Rotherham’s geological heritage doesn't rank high on their priorities.
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| Geological conservation in South Yorkshire |
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