Project Application: Great East Road Revamp(Shire and Bree)
Player name(s): Hearthseeker, Bogman
Player rank: [+]Builder
Private or Public: Private, unless we get depressed from lonliness
Location name: Great East Road
Lore
`… the only Númenórean roads were the great road linking Gondor and Arnor … and the East-West Road from the Grey Havens to Imladris. These roads crossed at a point [Bree] west of Amon Sûl (Weathertop) … [from Bree] east to Imladris [was] one hundred and sixteen [leagues] ***** … [Author’s note.]
[ ***** A league is approximately three miles.]
Unfinished Tales , Part 3, Ch 1, The Disaster of the Gladden Fields: Notes , Note 6
The village of Bree had some hundred stone houses of the Big Folk, mostly above the Road, nestling on the hillside with windows looking west. On that side … there was a deep dike with a thick hedge on the inner side. Over this the Road crossed by a causeway; but where it pierced the hedge it was barred by a great gate. There was another gate in the southern corner where the Road ran out of the village. …
Down on the Road, where it swept to the right to go round the foot of the hill, there was a large inn. It had been built long ago when the traffic on the roads had been far greater. For Bree stood at an old meeting of ways; another ancient road crossed the East Road just outside the dike at the western end of the village, and in former days Men and other folk of various sorts had travelled much on it. … But … the North Road was now seldom used: it was grass-grown, and the Bree-folk called it the Greenway.
The Inn of Bree was still there, however, and the innkeeper was an important person. His house was a meeting place … and a resort … for such travellers (mostly dwarves) as still journeyed on the East Road, to and from the Mountains.
The Fellowship of the Ring , LoTR Book 1, Ch 9, At the Sign of the Prancing Pony
The Route: West from Bree to the Grey Havens
… the five travellers rode up the climbing road and came to the South-gate of Bree. …
They … passed through the West-gate and on towards the Shire. …
… there was a grey mist on the Barrow-downs southwards, and a deep veil over the Old Forest far away.
The Return of the King , LoTR Book 6, Ch 5, Homeward Bound
… they faintly glimpsed a long dark line. ‘That is a line of trees,’ said Merry, ‘and that must mark the Road. All along it for many leagues east of the Bridge there are trees growing. Some say they were planted in the old days.’
The Fellowship of the Ring , LoTR Book 1, Ch 8, Fog on the Barrow-downs
… the travellers came at last to the Brandywine …
It was a good forty miles from the Bridge to Bag End…
As evening fell they were drawing near to Frogmorton, a village right on the Road, about twenty-two miles from the Bridge. There they meant to stay the night; Floating Log at Frogmorton was a good inn. …
It was about eighteen miles to Bywater, and they set off at ten o’clock in the morning. …
At the Three-Farthing Stone they … had done nearly fourteen miles with only one rest at noon. …
The Return of the King , LoTR Book 6, Ch 8, The Scouring of the Shire
And when they had passed from the Shire, going about the south skirts of the White Downs, they came to the Far Downs, and to the Towers, and looked on the distant Sea; and so they rode down at last to Mithlond, to the Grey Havens in the long firth of Lune.
The Return of the King , LoTR Book 6, Ch 9, The Grey Havens
Overhead plan:
Estimated population: About the same as what Ardacraft members are capable of producing.
In-game guide:
Terrain: There will be minor edits to the terrain, the road in a few places will be so deeply tread that holloways/sunken roads will form. In the Bree-lands I plan on shaping the road a bit better. Currently the road near Bree skirts in between fields. I don’t think this is realistic, because the road would have been there for hundreds of years at least and the settlement would have formed around the road, and not the other way around. More discussion should be had with Eaglz about this as his Breevamp starts as the fields were going to be changed/updated anyways. The road in some places is also too winding, so it will be straightened out where it makes sense and won’t cause too much of an overhaul or take too much time(fields in the shire don’t need to change, for example)
Reference Imagery:
https://nt.global.ssl.fastly.net/images/1431784630144-1431733379187-dunstable-downs-sunken-tracks.jpg
