Gifford woodland gets help from quarry

ACCESS and drainage at Gifford Community Woodland in East Lothian has been improved by a local quarry.

Longyester quarry, which is just three miles from the site, helped to maintain the drainage ditches in the wood.

Neville Kilkenny, project manager for the woodland, approached Tillicoultry Quarries, which owns Longyester, for help.

“They didn’t disappoint and we were delighted when they said yes,” said Kilkenny.

“The footfall within the woodland and on East Lothian’s path network has significantly increased since the start of the covid-19 pandemic as many of our community use it as the main destination for daily recreational walks and outdoor exercise.

“Though it is a fantastic and hugely valuable asset, one of our central paths – an old railway line which is a key link between our woodland and other core path routes – has poor drainage, which is causing accessibility challenges for some of our older and less able visitors.

“We’ve also had challenges with drainage from this area causing localised flooding.

“With Longyester Quarry on our doorstep, enabling us to minimise our environmental impact, and having been a customer of Tillicoultry Quarries myself, I hoped to secure some much-needed local business support to reprofile and maintain the drainage ditches using perforated pipework backfilled with 100 tonnes of gravel.”

Wallace Menzies, a director at Tillicoultry Quarries, added: ““Given the environmental importance of the work being done at Gifford Community Woodland, it’s positive impacts on the local community – especially throughout covid-19 – and with its proximity to our Longyester Quarry, we were only too pleased to offer our support.”

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