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TRIAL RIDING - or how mud could make you a criminal
By Patrick Evans, MAG and TRF member Word doc / PDF
Trial riding, or the art of falling off a bike at slow speed into mud, is the pastime I have been enjoying for the past 9 years.
The fun of riding deep into the English
and Welsh countryside on the few green lanes left to the many who enjoy this pastime on a freezing cold sunny winters morning up to your axles in mud and ice, or stopping and saying hello to horse riders
and dog walkers in
areas of beautiful woodland have hooked me into getting up at 7am on a dark frozen winter Sunday's morning.
I love to look around at the vast areas of empty
Britain, the hugely different landscapes and different colours of the forests between seasons.
The way the seasons change the farm field's shapes and depths as the crops grow, get harvested
and then die away.
The way the weather changes the views in the mountains of Wales and the sun melts the frost in strange shaded shapes.
I get to see the huge amount of wildlife still left
in our wilderness and how close it still lives to our ever encroaching housing estates.
We get to travel about 100 mile in a day, in small groups, with a decent pub lunch, tea and a Mars bar in
the woods miles from anyone and talk about how slippery the last lane was and how it must be time to replace the tyres.
This combined with motorcycling is why this is my hobby, but the fact I
choose to do this on a motorised vehicle, has now become a point of hatred to some people.
Rights of Way
Green lanes are the remaining Rights Of Way that criss-cross the
countryside between fields, along hedge lines, through woods and over mountains and moors that were formed when man first started walking between places to hunt for food. Some of these have since
been
given a layer of tarmac or concrete and have an M, A or B classification Most of the rest are marked on an Ordnance Survey map as a Footpath, Bridleway, RUPP (Road Used as a Public Path), BOAT
(Byway Open to All Traffic) or UCR (Unclassified County Road). All of them are maintained by our Taxes.
Footpaths and Bridleways are in the majority of these (about 95%) and are closed to
vehicular traffic.
Some RUPP's are for vehicular traffic and some are not.
BOAT's , as the naming implies, are open to all traffic and have the same laws on them as the M1 and A30,
but for the most part with no graded surface.
Problems on the horizon
Up until recently everyone got along; walkers, horse riders, cyclists, motorcyclists, drivers and
farmers. But now the ramblers seem to have been bitten by greed and selflessness.
A minority of people who have lied and made up complaints about supposed damage in the surface of these unmade
roads which has resulted in the countryside minister, Alun Michael, proposing to downgrade two thirds of what we can ride and drive on to
"Restricted Byways".
After 100 years,
during which time the highways and byways of England and Wales have been explored and enjoyed by generations of drivers and motorcyclists, the proposal just put out to consultation by the Department of
Environment, Farming & Rural Affairs
(DEFRA) looks set to change the face of recreational motoring for ever. http://www.defra.gov.uk/news/2003/031209a.htm
The proposed legislation could also affect any type of motor sport which uses minor public roads, and it severely threatens some of the UK's oldest automobile competitions, including famous
classic trials organised by bodies like the Motor Cycling Club (whose
Edinburgh Trial, for example, celebrates its centenary in June 2004).
The change is part of the fallout from the
Countryside and Rights of Way Act 2000, which introduced the right to roam for hikers across thousands of square miles of private land - and is largely driven by a vocal and influential minority which
wants motor vehicles out of the countryside - full stop.
It is grossly unfair to propose an ill-thought change in legislation that damages our centuries-old highway law, takes away the rights of
ordinary people enjoying an arcane, but historic, pastime, does little to tackle the root causes of the problems, and gives yet more exclusive territory to ramblers, who already enjoy more access than
they can ever possibly need or use!
In England and Wales, there are around 120,000 miles of footpaths and bridleways where motorists cannot go, whereas there are only around 6,000 miles of minor,
unsealed vehicular roads, much of which is also enjoyed by walkers, cyclists and riders.
Walkers now have or will soon have thousands of square miles of open access countryside as well, plus they
can wander at will on urban commons and through Forestry Commission plantations. Ramblers already have exclusive rights to most of the British countryside: now they want the rest too.
Almost all
of the damage that motorcyclists and 4X4's are accused of is done by the farm vehicles that use them to access their land and the overuse of over publicised walks and rambles such as the Ridgeway.
In areas of outstanding natural beauty in the Lake District for example the large number of walkers has destroyed vast swathes of footpath and created huge amounts of erosion that has resulted in
making it impossible to walk there. These areas are now blighted by ugly scars on the scenery.
We all have a right to enjoy the countryside around us and the natural beauty of our country. If the
proposed legislation comes through this will be a privilege allowed to a chosen few. This should not be allowed and we need to do something about it now.
The countryside is large enough for all to enjoy.
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