Let’s celebrate Britain’s natural lifelines | Hugh Warwick
Roads and railways don’t always blight landscapes – they are also vital havens for wildlife
The next time you are on a train take a moment to look out of the window. As you trundle along the line consider all the other lines you can see – roads, canals, power lines; and (once you’re out of the city) hedges, ditches, dykes and drystone walls.
It is one of the defining features of humanity that we love lines. So significant is our love that we have created a “linescape” out of the landscape. These lines bring with them both great benefits to the life with which we share the land and also considerable threat. The first lines we etched into the land were specifically to fragment it – to assert ownership or restrain livestock – but these have inadvertently become the agents of connectivity for wildlife. For instance, stoats make wonderful use of walls to weave their way through moorland.
Land alongside roads are home to more than 800 species of plant and can be, if managed sensitively, a refuge
Source: Guardian Transport
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