I'm sitting here typing this on a Saturday afternoon listening to Brighton, my football team, failing at a gallant giant-killing act in the fourth round of the FA Cup against Aston Villa. "What is the relevance of that?" you might wonder. Well, both Brighton and Hove Albion FC and myself were born in Shoreham-by-Sea, a town just along the coast, and from where all the pictures on this page were taken at the end of 2009.
The first image (above) is a familiar local landmark, lying at Beeding just to the north of Shoreham. The cement works are now abandoned and derelict. Further down the River Adur, however, is another old structure that's still in working order, following extensive restoration in 2008. The old wooden toll bridge (below), constructed in 1781, once carried all the road traffic on the A27 across the river, up until the 1960s when the Spaghetti Junction-like bypass and flyover were constructed just to the north, and traffic now hurtles out of the South Downs and spares the wooden bridge. It was the last toll bridge operating in Sussex and is now a Grade II* listed building. Old photos show even double decker buses crossing it, which is rather difficult to believe, but my own Queen Geanine could only park up at its western end since these days pedestrians, walkers, cyclists and horse-riders are exclusively permitted to use it.
There is a small road linking the A27 with the A259 coast road, running around the perimeter of Shoreham Airport (below), which is the oldest licensed airfield in the UK. Amongst its other claims to fame, some scenes from the film The Da Vinci Code were shot there (although it is masquerading as Biggin Hill, which is the aerodrome mentioned in the book).
Shoreham Airport is in fact located in neighbouring Lancing, a place which also lends its name to the most familiar landmark of all in the area, Lancing College. Its chapel can be seen here (below) on the hillside.
Like the nearby toll bridge, the art deco former airport passenger terminal (below) is also a Grade II listed building.
