A DISUSED railway line between Broadway and Honeybourne is being revived for public use by walkers, cyclists and horse riders.

Sustrans - the national sustainable transport charity - is clearing overgrowth along the former track to pave the way for its new purpose and has applied to Wychavon District Council for permission for a change of use.

The application includes seeking the go-ahead for removal of scrub and gravel.

Simon Ballantine, bridge engineer with Sustrans, said the charity had acquired the line, among with several hundred others all over the country, from the former British Rail in 1998.

"We own the rail line from Broadway to Honeybourne, which is the full extent of what we have put the planning application in for," he explained, adding that the stretch of line was around five miles long.

He went on: "For the one and a half miles from Broadway to Willersey, we want to build that as a public path because that gives you a link between the villages that are currently severed by the Broadway bypass."

Mr Ballantine explained that although clearance work was being carried out, the intention was to leave the pathway as natural as possible.

"We're not going to surface it," he said, "We're going to leave it for wildlife and for people to use for recreation."

He added that some parts of the line were currently "impenetrable" due to the vegetation that had sprung up.

"We're stripping that out because, at the moment, people have to fight through brambles to get through some sections," he said.

Mr Ballantine said Sustrans also owned seven bridges that carried the public highway over the railway line. The bridges were "a big liability" to the charity, he added. "They're 100 years old and are carrying 40-tonne lorries but were designed for horses and carts."

Part of the project would involve repair work to the bridges and cash for that would be raised by selling off gravel from the old railway line. "We're using the assets we have got to preserve the assets we need to preserve," he said.

Sustrans's flagship project was the National Cycling Network, to create 10,000 miles of routes throughout the UK, and it worked on other transport and environmental schemes.