Broomway

The Broomway is a public right of way (specifically a Byway Open to All Traffic, with a shorter section of bridleway) over the foreshore at Maplin Sands off the coast of Essex, England. When the tide is out, it provides access to Foulness Island, and indeed was the only access to Foulness on foot, and the only access at low tide, until a road bridge was built over Havengore Creek in 1922.

At least 598 years old, recorded as early as 1419, the Broomway runs for 6 miles (9.7 km) along the Maplin Sands, some 440 yards (400 m) from the present shoreline. It was named for the "brooms", bundles of twigs attached to short poles, with which the route was once marked. A number of headways or hards ran from the track to the shore, giving access to local farms. The track is extremely dangerous in misty weather, as the incoming tide floods across the sands at high speed, and the water forms whirlpools because of flows from the River Crouch and River Roach. Under such conditions, the direction of the shore cannot be determined. After the road bridge was opened in 1922, the Broomway ceased to be used, except by the military.

The Broomway is clearly very old, and there is some disagreement over whether the main route is natural or partly or wholly man-made. Traces of Roman settlement on Foulness have been taken as evidence of a Roman origin, and it has been suggested that the track and its feeders were originally a road serving an agricultural area that was subsequently flooded. It has also been surmised to be an Anglo-Saxon era drove route, again subsequently inundated due to coastal erosion or 14th century storm surges but maintained using local knowledge and temporary waymarks. An archaeological survey towards the southern end of the Broomway revealed that it had, at least on that section, been reinforced with wooden hurdle work at some point.

Noted in 1419, the route was mentioned in the following century by William Harrison in the Chronicles of Holinshed, who said that a man could ride to Foulness "if he be skilful of the causie [causeway]". The Broomway was shown in some detail, along a route very similar to the present-day one, by the surveyor John Norden in a 1595 map.

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Wikipedia