Podgill Viaduct and Smardale Trails
Part of project: Access to Eden: breaking barriers, building bridges
Aim: To increase the number of places in the Eden where those with sensory and physical challenges can experience nature on their own terms.
Lead partner: Yorkshire Dales National Park Authority
Activities planned
- Improve 1.5km of path to be fully accessible from east of Smardale to the road head before Waitby Greenriggs and reinstate bridges.
- Hold workshops with beneficiaries to design, test and build a sensory trail along the Podgill trail.
- Undertake an 18 month engagement programme for potential users of both routes, focusing on those with sensory and physical impairments as well as other under-resourced local communities without resources to visit. Link with Access the Dales’ activity programme.
- Signpost participants to other events and activities with the Access to Eden programme further north.
- Hold dedicated open days for both trails.
Autumn / Winter 2024 Update
Bridges for Smardale Gill are ready for ordering now that prices have been updated. A Biodiversity Net Gain (BNG) assessment is now underway at Smardale but will require an additional badger survey which has now been commissioned.
In pictures…
Site visit to walk the route of new accessible path and bridge installations at Smardale Gill
Site visit to walk the route of new accessible path and bridge installations at Smardale Gill
Site visit to walk the route of new accessible path and bridge installations at Smardale Gill
View of the span required for new bridge installation to cross roadway at Smardale Gill
Road to be spanned by new overhead bridge, providing uninterrupted accessible pathway at Smardale Gill
Site visit to walk the route of new accessible path and bridge installations at Smardale Gill
Site visit to walk the route of new accessible path and bridge installations at Smardale Gill
View of span required for new bridge installation to cross roadway at Smardale Gill
Thank you
This project is supported by the Access to Eden: breaking barriers, building bridges partnership project led by Eden Rivers Trust with a grant from The National Lottery Heritage Fund and the Yorkshire Dales National Park Authority.
