well .. I read in the newspaper tonight that plans to open up the mines are still going ahead despite the failure to win lottery cash ..it's just anticipated that it will take them 10 years to complete rather than 6 as they will have to secure other sources of funding in phases as they go along .

According to the Times today, the Sustrans bid was assisted by questionable practices.... it seems it was possible to vote from multiple phone lines and email addresses, and the people behind sustrans were encouraging their supporters to register multiple votes.
Needless to say, supporters of the other projects are spitting pips over this :curse:

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In that case, I hope Sustrans will be suitably "rewarded" by having their bid cancelled!

"my dad was involved in surveying the mines in the 60's for the local firebrigade, so they had something to work from if they ever needed to carry out a rescue operation down the mines, he even talks of a through trip they did from the Wrens Nest coming up in Dudley Zoo. I have a few paragraphs from a recent email from him describing their expolits - i could post them on here if anyone is interested..?"


Yes, please post.
This is amazing.
I have very distant memories of this myself, but was unsure because when you get older memory can play tricks.

Here is a true story about this.
There was a gang of us who used to meet in the downstairs bar of the George Hotel (now a Sainsburys) on Saturday nights. We used to decide what to do later. This was about 1963, Walsall centre has changed a lot. Anyway, sometimes there would be a party on somewhere, we were all party mad. Basically, it was a sort of boozy 'love in' usually at the home of some rich bird whose parents were away. Use your imagination.
If there was no party on, we would all meet in the centre of Walsall, a place called "The Bridge", outside "Henry's" a big department store by the hot dog stand. There was another crowd, the same lot as I used to go to Bryneglwys with. So we would have another 'Chinese Parliament' about where to go for the night, it wast a Saturday unless you were out all night! Usually, our choice would be between either an old disused mansion, reputed to be haunted near Womburn, or 'the caves' at Dudley. And if so, which ones. Well this one night, I cant remember which one we went to but I believe it was the Wrens Nest, we also took some booze. We got there about 3.0 am on the Sunday morning, had more to drink, and then went exploring. I can remember a very long passage that just went on and on. In front was a chap named Jimmy Ford, and suddenly he stopped dead, shining his torch on something on the floor. When we caught up with him we found a huge terd, and do I mean huge. Jim looked at it and exclaimed "I dont know what could have done that, but whatever it is, I dont want to meet it!"
We all looked at each other and turned back.
This is true to the best of my memory

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Sorry me again, I have just picked this up.

"According to the Times today, the Sustrans bid was assisted by questionable practices.... it seems it was possible to vote from multiple phone lines and email addresses, and the people behind sustrans were encouraging their supporters to register multiple votes. "

This is amazing, just what was it that I said to you all???

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Vote Black Country Urban Park for £50 million

Thank you so much for all your support so far. The telephone number to vote for Black Country Urban Park to win £50 million is 0870 24 24 604

You can vote at least 3 times.
Here’s how:
1 Call 0870 24 24 604 from your landline
2 Call 0870 24 24 604 from your mobile
3 On www.thepeoples50million.org.uk

Every vote counts – one per email address, one per landline number and one per mobile number.

I know it doesn't sound fair if Sustrans were 'fixing' votes in any way ... but .. isn't multiple voting what we were all encouraged to do in the promotional ads that went out .. as above ? I just wonder how much money they made from all the phone votes .. and if in fact it cost them anyything at all to 'give away' national lottery money ! :confused:

If I rememebr correctly (very doubtful!) 0870 numbers cost 8p per minute of which 6p goes to destination of call and 2p goes to BT (or whoever).

Yes, the ads seemed to say vote 3 times, but what The Times article seems to be saying is Sustrans got same people to vote several times from different number/email addresses etc. A subtle difference, but still a fiddle.

Backtracking slightly, thanks for the Wrens nest GR Carnkie.

My Dad was involved in surveying the Dudly Mines in the 60's, while at college, for the local fire brigade in case they ever needed to carry out a rescue operation. As requested Here are a few paragraphs from some recent correspondance we've had re: the Mines.

Did you see the Birmingham Post supplement last weekend ? It’s actually called ‘Weekend’ and incorporated a whole section about the caves under Dudley and the Wren’s Nest. You may remember I was involved in surveying them way back in the early 60s. There are some interesting pictures of the underground canals and galleries.

'Thanks for the website information, I’ve just had a look and they seem to be doing quite a lot of work in the caverns with walkways and goodness knows what. Although I vaguely recognize some of the spots, its very different from the days when we manhandled a folding boat we borrowed from the Dudley fire brigade down the Wren’s nest, launched it on the underground canal which had been sealed off by a roof fall and paddled off to access galleries which had been cut off for years and were accessible only from the water. It was extremely dangerous with an unstable, unsupported roof in places – we must have been mad. I always remember how clear the water was and how we literally appeared to be floating between the ceiling and the floor in our torch beams, with no way back if anything happened to the boat except to swim for it. In places the whole ceiling was covered with delicate limestone straws produced by years and years of water dripping down through the rock. They were very beautiful and creamy white in colour – we had to be very careful we didn’t damage them as we passed through. In some places [presumably where the rock was unstable], the tunnel roof was supported by a brick lining, which had become distorted by the pressure of the rocks above and bulged down so much that we had to lie flat in the boat or crawl to avoid dislodging it. We had to be extremely careful not to touch it or even make a noise, it was so unstable, the lot could have come down at any moment. We’d go through these narrow parts and then emerge into huge new caverns. Where there had been shafts at one time linking these galleries to the surface there were huge cone shaped piles of debris on the floor of the caverns – soil, rocks and piles of bones believe it or not, [none of them human], I remember bringing back piles of skulls to identify the animals.

I agree with you about the Eden Project. Eden was looking to use the cash for its third biome which would look at the impact of climate change and the way that humans adapt to different and changing situations.

The ambitious scheme had received great backing from all over Cornwall and all over the world, including an endorsement from the UN.

It is not known whether the plans can still go ahead without the funding which would have been available from the National Lottery.

On the subject of the best time to visit. The last time I went turned out to be the hottest day of the year. I think I grew about threee inches during the course of the day. 🙂

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Steve Powell's work on the Dudley limestone mines is now available through the PDMHS website - http://www.pdmhs.com/PDFs/ScannedBulletinArticles/Bulletin%2014-1%20-%20The%20Dudley%20Limestone%20Mines.pdf 

I think I bought the last copy from the Mining Museum not all that long ago!

[tweak]Link made clickable[/tweak]

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Hmm .. looks like interesting reading .. thanks for that .. I'll have to look properly later as I should be on my way to work now !

The Dudley Limestone mines book - was produced jointly by The Shropshire Caving and Mining Club - copies are available from the Dudley canal trust shop.


If you have never been this is a superb trip into the tunnels on an electric narrow boat - it really is very good. If you go on the right day you can sneak into the Blak Country museum and have fish chips cooked in beef dripping - not healthy but by far the best

Not sure if this has been posted elsewhere.

http://www.forkers.co.uk/projects/profiles/NorthernGalleryAccessWorksAndSevenSistersTemporaryStoneInfill.pdf 

Did a few mines in the area years ago including one under Dudley Zoo.

Edit: Link OK on the preview page?

Hope this works.

http://www.forkers.co.uk/projects/profiles/NorthernGalleryAccessWorksAndSevenSistersTemporaryStoneInfill.pdf 

Go to the map link at the bottom of the page.

http://www.dudley.gov.uk/leisure-and-culture/museums--galleries/dudley-museum--art-gallery/heritage/wrens-nest-national-nature-reserve 

If this is generating interest try to locate:

PDMHS Bulletin Vol 14 No 1 by Steve Powell

200 years of Dudleys Limestone Workings and Caves, good old Steve again

Dudley Canal Tunnel, Dudley Canal Trust.

Just pulled this off my database.

I have tried to upload this document, does not seem to open on here?

Fixed the link to the document now, thanks for uploading it :flowers:

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– soil, rocks and piles of bones believe it or not, [none of them human], I remember bringing back piles of skulls to identify the animals.

Did you find anything a bit exotic? Apparently, the Zoo used to dispose of their dead animals down one of the mine shafts... I read a story somewhere of someone abseiling down a shaft and coming face-to-face with a rotting tapir. They also tried to dispose of a dead elephant(!!!) in a sink hole if I remember rightly!

Hi

Who is your dad? I went to the Wrens Nest yesterday with my friend who was in the Auxillary Fire service at that time and remembers taking the folding boat into the mine, he went on to form the Dudley Cave Rescue Team - of which I was a member.

Are you talking about John Smith?