Open Space
Banstead Downs is a large site of Special Scientific Interest, covering 430 acres (1.7 km2). The town to the north is Sutton; whilst Banstead lies to the south. It lies at about 125 m above sea level and is bisected by a railway line.
The Downs is one of four green areas in the area, which are overall referred to as Banstead Commons. The other areas are Burgh Heath (87 acres), Banstead Heath (760 acres) and Park Downs (74 acres). Banstead Downs is home to the rare Small Blue butterfly. The four tumuli (burial mounds) that can be seen on the Downs have been identified as dating from Saxon times and are known as the Gally Hills because they are the site of a 15th century gallows.
Read more about this topic: Banstead
Famous quotes containing the words open and/or space:
“Why make so much of fragmentary blue
In here and there a bird, or butterfly,
Or flower, or wearing-stone, or open eye,
When heaven presents in sheets the solid hue?”
—Robert Frost (1874–1963)
“When Paul Bunyan’s loggers roofed an Oregon bunkhouse with shakes, fog was so thick that they shingled forty feet into space before discovering they had passed the last rafter.”
—State of Oregon, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)