Where to start finding out more about this unnamed stream? Well, we know that it flows into the River Roch at Pimhole, so perhaps the internet has a record of this tributary. I fire up that well-known knowledge-repository Wikipedia, search for the River Roch and my eyes instantly alight on a handily-drawn “network map” of the river, its crossings and tributaries.
So there’s Heap Bridge and the M66, then the access road to Waterfold business park… and there’s the East Lancs Railway viaduct… so… but now we’re at a bridge called Water Farm, which must be the footpath further along, so we must’ve gone too far? Although the diagram does appear to show tributaries further along in both directions, it’s not showing *our* mystery stream.
What’s this? Moving back to the main text of the piece, there’s a section named “Tributaries” with some additional listed, but they’re plain text rather than a tempting blue link you can click. No-one’s gotten round to writing an article about poor old Gigg Brook or Barn Brook. Are either of these the one I’m looking for?
My first instinct is that it’s not Gigg Brook: that name must be related to Gigg Lane, home of the lamented Bury Town FC, and that part of town is decidedly to the south of where it needs to be. So could “Barn Brook” be the mysterious stream we’re looking for?
virtualnostril 
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