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Stourport-on-Severn

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Walk directions

From the car park opposite the garden centre turn left for 370yds (340m) to take a footpath on the western side of the A4025. Strike across this bottom part of Hartlebury Common: you’ll see some buildings in the far distance. Veer right, roughly following power lines, through silver birches, to find a sandy track at the back of some houses. At a modern housing estate join the tarmac briefly, aiming for a dirt track beyond the ‘Britannia Gardens’ sign and after Globe House. Turn left down a tarmac footpath, initially with wooden paling on the left, to the river.

Turn right. In 650yds (594m) you’ll reach a lock and Stourport’s canal basins. You’ll probably want to spend some time exploring here but the route is neither across the two-plank walkway at the upper lock gate, nor the upper brick bridge with timber and metal railings; instead take the neat brick-paved path to circumnavigate The Tontine (see What to see). Now skirt the Upper Basin, passing Limekiln Chandlers. Across York Street join the tow path. Follow this for a little under 0.75 miles (1.2km), leaving it at the Bird in Hand, before a defunct brick railway bridge.

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Location

Nearest postcode:

Additional information

Terrain - Tow path, tracks, good paths, some streets

Landscape - Urban, watery, and common with views

Dog friendliness - Good on common and tow path, not much fun in town

Parking - Hartlebury Common Bog Car Park on A4025 opposite Cooks Garden Centre or layby 164ft (150m) further south

Toilets en route - None on route

About the walk

You will understand the rise and fall of Stourport-on-Severn if you look at a map of England. The infrastructural advantage realised by the opening of the Staffordshire and Worcestershire Canal was to link the River Severn with the rivers Trent and Mersey. Canals were conceived when road transport... was not only uncomfortable for passengers but also extremely slow for goods, and railways had yet to be invented. Roads were in a poor condition, invariably worsened by poor weather in the winter months. River transport was, at least, an option along the Severn. (In comparison, Herefordshire’s River Wye was usually too low in the summer months to give sufficient draught to even a small sailing barge.) A horse and cart could carry perhaps 300lb (136kg). Along a canal tow path, a horse could haul a barge carrying a vastly greater burden – up to 50 tons (50,679kg), a more than 300-fold weight advantage. Although the horse moved slowly, it is easy to see why those with money to invest fashionably threw it at all manner of canal projects. For Joe Public the main outcome was cheaper coal. In 1771, when the Staffordshire and Worcestershire Canal opened, Stourport grew up, becoming what we might now call a ‘new town’. As well as barge- and boat-building enterprises, other businesses, such as foundries and carpet factories, were opened. After just four decades, trade was hit by the new Worcester and Birmingham Canal, which had itself been 24 years in the making. Railway proliferation sent Stourport into further decline. When the canals were nationalised in 1948, the days of commercial canal activity were already numbered. In the case of the Worcester and Birmingham Canal, the last two companies to use the canal regularly ceased doing so in the early 1960s; they were Worcester’s Royal Porcelain (for coal) and Cadbury’s of Bournville (for chocolate crumb). Commercial activity on the canal today centres on canal-boat cruising and in a sense we have the railways to thank for this. The initial response by the canal-boat operators to the commercial threat posed by the railways was to cut prices, and this meant cutting costs. Labour was not in short supply, so wages for boatmen were cut; their response, since so much of their time was spent on the water anyway, was to shed the burden of rent-paying by bringing their families on board their barges.

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About the area

Worcestershire is a county of rolling hills, save for the flat Vale of Evesham in the east and the prominent spine of the Malverns in the west. Nearly all of the land is worked in some way; arable farming predominates – oilseed rape, cereals and potatoes – but there are concentrated areas of specific land uses, such as market gardening and plum growing.

Route details

Difficulty:

Medium

Gradient:

Gentle

Distance:

3.25 miles (5.3kms)

Ascent:

328ft (100m)

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Stourport-on-Severn

Recommended by

Walk details

Difficulty:

Medium

Gradient:

Gentle

Distance:

3.25 miles (5.3kms)

Ascent:

328ft (100m)

Walk directions

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2 of 4

Go down Holly Road, then half left into Mill Road, following it for 0.25 miles (400m), over a mini-roundabout and, bearing right at The Osiers, across the River Stour to the B4193. Cross and go to the left of the hairdressers to take a narrow, sandy, uphill path back on to the common. Soon, at a fork, go left, keeping in this direction as the ground levels and a parking area lies to the left. Go ahead to find, adjacent to a wire fence, the unpainted trig point.

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Now retrace your steps for about 90yds (82m), passing a wooden waymarker, to a junction. Here turn left, away from the car park. Again in about 90yds (82m), at a T-junction with a marker post, turn left (signposted ‘Heather Trail’). At the corner of a conifer plantation, 275yds (251m) further, turn right. After 100yds (91m) turn left, then in 220yds (201m), just after the far end of the plantation, enjoy views to the west. Now 65yds (60m) beyond this viewpoint, take the right option at a subtle fork. Go forward on this for another 250yds (229m), until an opening on the right. Here step very carefully over a pair of exposed and disused (but not actually hazardous) pipes. Follow the sandy track slanting downhill for 110yds (100m), then swing right, heading towards the road. Turn right and return to the car park.

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Location

Starting point

Nearest postcode:

Additional information

Terrain - Tow path, tracks, good paths, some streets

Landscape - Urban, watery, and common with views

Dog friendliness - Good on common and tow path, not much fun in town

Parking - Hartlebury Common Bog Car Park on A4025 opposite Cooks Garden Centre or layby 164ft (150m) further south

Toilets en route - None on route

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About the walk

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Been on this walk?

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About the area

Worcestershire

Stourport-on-Severn

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Walking in Safety

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Stourport-on-Severn

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