Yardley Old Village is a haven of rural peace set in the middle of the suburban expanse of East Birmingham. There is a cluster of listed buildings around the mediaeval church of St Edburgha, which includes an old farm and a working blacksmith. The church is currently swathed in scaffolding so no picture I’m afraid.

St Edburgha ( pronounced edburra) was grand-daughter to King Alfred and her relics are in Pershore Abbey whose full name is  the Abbey Church of Holy Cross with St Edburgha. I’m not sure if there are any other churches dedicated to her.

On the way there I surveyed  the new route of the A4040 Church Road, opened this week to accommodate the controversial development of a new Tesco store. The road still awaits a roundabout at its northern end, so the bus route relations haven’t been updated yet. Let’s see how long it takes other map-makers to update this stretch of road.

I drove though here one night and got very confused with the new northbound carriageway going right through the middle of what used to be a roundabout, so I decided to do a survey.  The results are shown below. Is this a record for the number of sets of traffic lights you can fit onto one roundabout? (9 sets and 2 sets of toucan crossing lights!)

Needless to say I couldn’t waste the opportunity so I surveyed some adjoining streets also. I came across what has to be one of the longest  and most evocative church names I’ve ever seen. I don’t know the origins of this church, but I expect it to have been interesting. Has anyone else come across one of these churches?

I also discovered a small patch of rural delight nearby – what a great way to enliven an otherwise patch of waste ground and make our urban life brighter. Congratulations to whoever is responsible. It’s not a great photo but there’s a sea of white daisies awash with poppies.

Sometimes I feel the urge to break out from my urban conurbation surroundings and map somewhere all together more rural. I don’t get much time these days to map so it was a real pleasure to head out in the autumn sunshine yesterday on the bike. The destinations I picked were Colwich and Little Hayward which are located between Stafford and Rugeley and were essentially blank on the map save for the A51, the railway lines, canal and the river Trent, all of which run parallel through the area.

One of the things I really enjoy about mapping for OSM are those things that you would never see or learn about (and which you can add to the map) if it were not for getting out there on the ground. Yesterday was no exception but unlike the usual notable place of interest, interesting feature or great view it was a moment to reflect, for I stumbled upon a tiny beautifully tended memorial garden, easily missed and tucked away at the specific spot of a tragic event in 1986, the Colwich Rail Crash, something I really had no knowledge of previously. The garden is now a memorial to two men, Eric Goode the train driver who tragically died in the crash, and Alf Taylor, a retired railwayman who created and tended the garden until his death in 1997. OpenStreetMap gives us the opportunity to place important places in our landscape like this clearly on the map, something I’m always pleased to be able to do. Should you wish to find it yourself it’s here.