The Lady of the Lake 
A different slant will be given to ’Nature Walks’ following the completion of the Shotton surface mining project 

A surface mining project in the North of England has won a BE Award of Excellence at the Bentley User Conference in 2005. Gone are the days when towering slag heaps blighted the grey landscapes of the country’s Industrial North. In our current enlightened and environmentally aware climate, no one can set about hacking open large areas of the countryside without proving to the local populace their intention to replace and even improve on the one they are removing.

Such is the case, therefore, for the Shotton surface mining project in Northumberland, under the management of HJ Banks and Company, that will provide much needed fuel, in the form of high quality, low sulphur coal, to power a local major industry — Alcan.The ten-year project will also provide fireclay and shale for local brickmakers as a by-product of the extraction of the coal.

The third object of the project, though, is the one that caught the Bentley judges’ eyes, short-listing the project for the award. From day one of the extraction process, work will begin on restoration of the site, providing public access to a unique landscape encompassing natural and historic aspects of the region, and, to the south of the area, creating a landscaped park designed by world-renowned architect and designer Charles Jencks, featuring a massive reclining female figure lying alongside a series of lakes reflecting the local landscape.