Long Ashton Bypass

I found this location by chance, stuck on a diverted route, with traffic at a standstill, I took a quick phone photo of this bridge as a reminder to come back some time and take some proper photos.

This road is on the bike path between Bristol and Nailsea, you actually have to cross this road as part of the path, which I’ve ridden before, but I’ve never thought to venture off and explore around this section. It just shows there is good stuff everywhere, you just have to look for it. It reminds me of the Bristol to Bath cycle path, when I first moved to Bristol I didn’t drive, so I used to spend hours and hours riding this path with my camera, and I feel like I must have explored every single little section, and followed every fork and offshoot to see where it leads, and what was hidden there.

Bikes are perfect for these little missions, as I can just head out with a location in mind, and there is nothing to prevent me stopping and exploring if I see something that catches my eye. I feel so much more nimble and reactive compared to driving, where it’s a bit dangerous to just slam on the brakes and stop if I see something that catches my eye.

I wanted to get a photo of this graffiti, I’m always fascinated by this specific kind of graffiti. It has a very serious apocalyptic tone, which is at odds with remote location, it reminded me of the rapture that wasn’t from earlier this year.

Plus it’s been done by someone with a spray can who felt that they had to go out and write this, which I find fascinating. There is no specific style, this hasn’t been done by someone in the graffiti scene, it’s just in someones block capital handwriting, which just makes me question their motivation. It’s so dramatic, why did they feel that they had to spray this on the bridge support?

I made a version with the graffiti on the side edited out, as it looks shit, and it disrupts the photo. But the editing doesn’t look great, and I’m not really comfortable with removing whole elements from a photo like this, so I won’t use this version. I’ll go back and shoot it again from the other side instead. I just have to hope the original graffiti hasn’t been removed by then, but I find anything in remote spots like this, basically never gets removed.

I’m going to head back at night one time, as I think it would look great illuminated from above by the road lights, even at dusk or blue hour, when the contrast would be a little more subtle. I think a late sunday summer evening would be best, as I’ll have the least chance of getting run over with my tripod set up in the middle of the road.