The Development of Ley Lines

Coined in 1921 by the amateur archaeologist Alfred Watkins, in his books Early British Trackways and The Old Straight Track, ley lines are ancient trackways that Watkins believes were created for ease of overland trekking by line-of-sight navigation during neolithic times, and had persisted in the landscape over millennia. Use of ley lines would no doubt be of use when new territories were being charted so roads could later be built but in 1969, writer John Michell revived ley lines to associate it with spiritual and mystical theories about alignments of land forms, and drawing on the Chinese concept of feng shui (which is more about building an ideal location of a home and how to layout said home than utilizing some mystical aspect of the world that we can not grasp). Michell would take Watkins definition of ley lines even further by implying that ley lines have spiritual power or resonate a special psychic or mystical energy that New Age occultists claim can be sources of power or energy.

By pin pointing sites on a map and then connecting the dots to one another, lines (or roads) will be made to connect said sites. It is foolish to think that a road that connects to any two sites has any magic power that flows through it especially when the ley is a variant of lea, "meaning grassland, clearing, or pasture. English towns with these names are somewhat common, e.g., Cantley (Cant's clearing)."



Source:
http://www.skepdic.com/leylines.html