Banburyshire Rambles Photo-Journal

This is the reciprocal view from the previous scene; looking down upon the valley of Highfurlong Brook where HS2 falls from the Ironstone escarpment down into the plain below – but doing so on an excessively broad embankment in order to dispose of all the spoil from the excavations that drop the track about 40 metres from the Ironstone slab into the Warwickshire plain.

Lower Boddington is a bit of a misnomer. Yes, it’s lower than Upper Boddington, but the village stretches all the way up the hillside. On a clear day you can see all the way down the Cherwell valley to Banbury from here.

That means that the whole village, especially the top from where this scene is taken, will have a ring-side seat for the truly massive undertaking of bringing HS2 from the Ironstone slab down into Warwickshire, and disposing of the large amount of spoil from the excavations required to do that.

In the panorama above: Aston le Walls is roughly behind the power pole on the left; the tunnel portal is roughly where the power cables from that pole trace a line down the hillside; Highfurlong Viaduct will roughly stand ampngst the trees above the first visible roof (and the top of a second power pole); the track falls below ground level, with its broad earthwork either side, in the middle of the expanse of green fields to the left of the large barn in the middle-right of the panorama; the line of trees extending in a line behind the barn is the road into Boddington; and finally the village can be seen on the right of the panorama.

When complete, HS2 will represent a great visual intrusion for this area. Likewise, as the track falls from the escarpment in its embankment and viaduct, it will have a line-of-sight that will exacerbate the impacts of noise pollution – as the earthworks will only screen the track when it reaches the valley floor.