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Black Down, the highest point of the Mendip Hills, hosted one of Britain's first Starfish sites: a beyond-top-secret WW2 programme of decoy cities intended to lure Luftwaffe bombers into dropping their payload on empty countryside.

Somerset has a diverse range of charming, whimsical and unusual place names, inspiring at least one poet. In this video I explore some of the etymological and historic stories behind these weird and wonderful village names.

After a deadly flood in 1957, Valencia took the radical decision to move its river completely outside the city. This 'Southern Plan' had far reaching effects for both the city and its rural environs. While the city gained desperately needed green space and some architecturally astonishing cultural facilities, much of its orchard hinterlands vanished under industrial sprawl. 0:00 Intro 1:25 Fata...

A brief look at one of Bristol's newest pieces of public art, commemorating the Shirehampton Remount Depot of World War One. Sources, credits, transcript: pedestriandiversions.github.io/videos/shirehampton-remount-depot.html

A week in and around St Just in Penwith, taking in the mining heritage of the Tin Coast and a selection of prehistoric monuments and settlements. 0:00 Intro 2:01 Mining on the Tin Coast 5:02 Architectural vibes 6:23 Carn Gluze 7:57 Chapel Carn Brea 11:27 Carn Euny 13:53 Outro

In the second of my occasional series on Bristol's bridges, I set out to tell the story of the Langton Street Bridge, but accidentally end off going on a rant about urban planning and transport infrastructure spending...again. 0:00 The Banana Bridge 4:22 North: Langton Street and Redcliffe housing estate 6:25 South: Mead Street / Whitehouse Street industrial estates 8:00 Accessibility, capacity...

Plans are afoot to regenerate the 'Western Harbour' area of Bristol with a new road layout which will supposedly improve matters for drivers and local residents alike. We've been here before: the Cumberland Basin Road Scheme of the 1960s hired the pre-eminent landscape designer of the era, Dame Sylvia Crowe, to create a public piazza brimming with modernist optimism, and yet within a decade or ...

A tour of some of the relics of the Taunton Stop Line, a system of WW2 anti-tank defences running coast-to-coast across Somerset and Devon. 0:00 Intro 3:46 River Parrett 4:59 Bridgwater & Taunton Canal 8:32 Chard Canal 10:17 Great Western Railway (Chard branch) 12:30 Policy turns against stop lines 15:24 Camouflaging the stop line 17:36 Conclusion / outro

Lots of towns and villages in England have 17th-century lock-ups, not many have them on a bridge. The story of Bradford's "blind house", and how it may or may not have been a 13th-century chapel before it became a holding cell. 0:00 The Bradford-on-Avon bridge and blind house 2:36 Knobs versus Gudgeons 3:08 Bridge chapels, Aubrey and Leland 5:19 St Lawrence Bridge and Chapel, Bath 7:23 Bradford...

Nails, railway time, rustication, Hyacinth Bouquet and Stonehenge: the story of Bristol's Exchange and its architect John Wood the Elder features many diverse and perhaps unexpected connections. 0:00 Cash on the nail(s) 1:55 Railway time 2:41 The Exchange - a brief history 5:42 Rustication and Hyacinth Bouquet 8:55 John Wood the Elder and Bath 11:16 Stonehenge, Bladud, Druids and Freemasonry

A look at the various monuments in Bristol to Raja Rammohan Roy, an influential Bengali polymath who sadly died here in 1833. 0:00 Intro 1:12 Brief and uninformed summary of his work and influence 2:23 Death in Stapleton 3:12 Lant and Mary Carpenter 4:38 Rammohan Roy's mausoleum 5:42 Why he was in the UK 7:30 Legacy 9:33 Outro Sources, credits, transcript: pedestriandiversions.github.io/videos/...

A funny story that turned out to be not very funny once I actually thought about it. 0:00 Monkeys in the rhyne 0:40 In the what now?? 1:12 Wet feet and missing plaque 2:42 Bostock and Wombwell's Menagerie 3:55 Not such a funny story 5:01 Outro Sources, credits, transcript: pedestriandiversions.github.io/videos/tickenham-monkey-bridge.html

I made some mistakes in my last video, sorry about that. 0:00 Route of the Bristol and Gloucester Railway 1:37 Logic of a Brandon Hill station 3:06 Bristol and London and South Western (Junction) Railway 4:07 Outro Sources, credits, transcript: pedestriandiversions.github.io/videos/bristol-central-station-corrections.html

A look at the four schemes in the 1860s to replace or supplement Bristol Temple Meads with a more centrally located station. Errata (sorry!): I made some mistakes so I made a corrections video. Please see here: ruclips.net/video/EDHjqFLSwco/видео.html 0:00 The origins of Temple Meads 1:58 Railways arrive in Bristol 3:23 Shortcomings of Temple Meads 4:46 Proposed Bristol & Clifton Railway (1862)...

The tragic naphtha explosion at the Bathurst Basin, 21st November 1888

Christmas Steps - hospitals, almshouses and the accidental relevance of benevolence

The thriving community demolished for a road never built: Totterdown vs the Three Lamps Interchange

The 15th century Wiltshire woman who funded a footpath - Maud Heath's Causeway

I joined an ancient Bristol tradition - the St Mary Redcliffe Pipe Walk

The surprisingly important history of teazels

What happened to the minster in Bedminster?

The Westbury White Horse: Legends of Alfred the Great and the Battle of Ethandun

(Not) Brunel's Bristol

Bristol's OTHER suspension bridges

Rubble & limestone: Bristol University's new library versus the fabric of the city

Slag, slimes and gruffy ground: a brief history of Mendip lead mining

How did the centre of Bristol end up next to a lake in Wiltshire?

Somerset's fives walls, and how medieval English churchyards inspired a sport that's big in Nigeria

Redcliffe Shot Tower: a world-first in industrial history, demolished for a 60s road-widening scheme