Those of you who have been to St Giles’ recently will have seen the brand new path which has been laid in the churchyard. This is part of a long standing desire by the PCC to improve access to the church, especially for those with wheelchairs and buggies. So the step from the car park area into the churchyard has been removed, the path graded, the edgings reset and resurfaced with self- binding compacted material to retain the look and feel of the old path. Our thanks go to Terry Clay for the very high quality of his work, to Charles Gurden for managing the project and to the Stonepit Charity for awarding us a grant which made the work possible. For the work to take place, the wrought iron gates at the main entrance and the wooden gate from the road had to be removed. The latter of these will be replaced as soon as a second new gate post has been fitted. Regarding the iron gates, the PCC has been exploring two options for their replacement:
1) to have the old gates modified to add circa 150mm (6 inches) to the height, add new hinges, and generally refurbish the rusting iron bars, or 2) have brand new iron gates produced. One quote has been received from an Oxfordshire blacksmith and because the cost for both options is not much different, the PCC’s preference is option 2, but we welcome any comments.
