Dinah's Hollow - the ongoing story. An Ancient Holloway, loved by locals, used for more than 1,000 years, but now threatened by the seemingly determined County officials in their drive for a final resolution to issues which began over forty years ago.
From the items on the Council meeting notes, an outsider would not know the full emotional impact for residents of the Melbury Abbas Parish, nor those living along the parallel A350 regarding one of the issues on the agenda. During an online Cabinet meeting on the 6th October, Dorset Council announced proposals to purchase the land on the east side of the C13, part of an ancient site known as Dinah’s Hollow, at a cost of £130,000, so that it could ‘carry out drainage works’. It further announced a longer-term plan, which could cost £4.5m of taxpayers’ money. But the villagers along the two roads knew this was a vital issue. Dinah’s Hollow’s roots, literally, go back a thousand years or more. This was the direct route to Shaftesbury Abbey in King Alfred’s time, and Roman remains suggest it was used by our ancestors far earlier. Driving through the deep cut hollow lane of what is now the C13, you see the trees lining the old valley. Like most ancient tracks in the county, the banks have for centuries been stabilised by the roots of the trees and vegetation, creating natural countryside management. The west bank of Dinah’s Hollow has been owned and maintained for more than 35 years by the Phillips family, using traditional land management techniques such as coppicing. There has been no landslip or degradation of this bank in living memory, the Blackmore Vale is told.
by Laura Hitchcock But in 2005, Dorset Council took on the management of a section of the east bank of Dinah’s Hollow, ‘fearing for public safety’. They proceeded to remove in excess of 140 trees and clear the land, and it was at this point, it is argued, that the current pattern of landslips began to occur on the east bank. In 2007, with apparently little local consultation on the decision, the ‘Unsuitable for HGV’ signs were removed from both the Shaftesbury and Blandford ends of the C13. The traffic continued to be an issue - not only in the way in which it encroached on the toe of the slopes when passing, causing subsidence, but also in the sheer narrowness of the road as it passes through Melbury Abbas. More than 1,000 cases are said to have been logged locally of traffic becoming jammed, due to vehicles being unable to pass each other. In 2014, Dorset County Council commissioned a report to investigate stabilisation options for the east bank. Suggested solutions ranged from biomanagement of the slopes to a scraping of all vegetation in order to insert soil nails and then to cover the slopes with mesh. However all work was suspended on the project in 2015, pending the outcome of bids for funding of an M4/Poole link. Instead, in 2017, a compromise was found in the form of a oneway system, with electronic signs advising HGVs to traverse south on the C13 via Dinah’s Hollow and Melbury Abbas, and north on the A350.
