Mountain bikers on a footpath. What to do?

katherinef said:
OP, is there any help you could get with this problem from the Oldham CountryRanger team?
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I've never heard of them before, who are they?

Hopefully the ROW officer will help. The council actually spent a fortune on this footpath a couple of years ago, including some resurfacing, floating footpaths and the kissing gate, so I hope that I can find the guy who organised it all...
 
Honey08 said:
I'm highly tempted to feed my horses their hard feed in the field and arrive up the path on a mountain bike with it, so they run at anyone on a bike (big greedy ISH), but I'd just end up getting sued.

I also thought about digging some huge drainage ditches either side of the stile with a pipe going under the thin footpath, so it's a boggy wet mess either side of the stile and a nuisance for them. The boggy soil around the stream is full of iron so goes rust red and stains clothes....
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I think these are bot brilliant ideas.. Especially the feeding one!
 
A different and possibly contrary viewpoint but I'm with penny turner and zero000000 so my reaction would be to securely fence my land (post and rail) excluding the bit where the footpath runs across, then replace the kissing gate with an ordinary opening gate so that the cyclists and horse riders can use it, and have it used/treated/regarded as a bridleway (walkers, cyclists, horse riders) rather than just a footpath.

Those of us who "own" land only really own it for our lifetime. After our death, anything can happen. Whether we own land or not, we are merely short-term guardians in the overall time of planet Earth. Many footpaths are simply bridleways or byways which were wrongly recorded as footpaths.

If the gates open easily, everyone can use them safely and without damaging them or adjoining fencing.

If the route is separated by solid fencing from the field, then there's no escaping livestock issue.
 
That only really works well if the path is at the edge of your field though, otherwise it can cause issues for it's use/access to water etc.
 
ester said:
That only really works well if the path is at the edge of your field though, otherwise it can cause issues for it's use/access to water etc.
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That's a valid reason for a footpath diversion, which you should be able to agree with your local ROW officer.
 
Suechoccy said:
A different and possibly contrary viewpoint but I'm with penny turner and zero000000 so my reaction would be to securely fence my land (post and rail) excluding the bit where the footpath runs across, then replace the kissing gate with an ordinary opening gate so that the cyclists and horse riders can use it, and have it used/treated/regarded as a bridleway (walkers, cyclists, horse riders) rather than just a footpath.

Those of us who "own" land only really own it for our lifetime. After our death, anything can happen. Whether we own land or not, we are merely short-term guardians in the overall time of planet Earth. Many footpaths are simply bridleways or byways which were wrongly recorded as footpaths.

If the gates open easily, everyone can use them safely and without damaging them or adjoining fencing.

If the route is separated by solid fencing from the field, then there's no escaping livestock issue.
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Honey08 has already stated that she lives in an area of the country where there are a wealth of tracks and byways which are currently unused, so why would it be necessary to convert this footpath into a bridlepath?

There are plenty of well used footpaths around me which serve perfectly well as a footpath, and to open it up to other users would inadvertently worsen the condition of it for everyone, because in effect they are fields, not tracks, and the more traffic you put over them, the boggier they become.

Yes, we are custodians of the land, but there is a responsibility to the land management aspect as well as public access - think of the impact on soil structure, compaction and wildlife numbers with increased public access to every footpath in the countyside.
 
It does sound like quite a lot of money has gone into this path as a footpath though, it would be a shame for it to get damaged by other users (we have paid access to some local woods but keep off the designated footpaths on the horses for this reason), be an issue to relocate etc. Also presumably someone will put a claim in to have it upgraded?
 
Please do contact British Cycling and inform them of any incident, especially if the cyclists are wearing club shirts (name and shame).

My husband (who also is a horse rider), is a member and a keen cyclist.

Not enough is done to educate cyclist in the dangers of other bridleway / rural users. There are also a large group of rogue cyclist that ride aggressively and put all road users at risk

The more rural people / horse & dog owners speak out, something might get done ....or so we can hope!

If the appropriate bodies are not aware of the situation then they can't do anything to support and help.

We had an incident of a local club rider using our lanes as a race track. He zoomed past us 5 or 6 times spooking my youngster and putting our old boy at risk.

British cycling did listen and have been supportive.

Sadly the few spoil it for the majority.

Personally I hate cyclists with a passion but since we all have to share our beautiful countryside, we need to work together.
 
MagicMelon said:
If I had a footpath running through my field (which I don't as up here anyone can go anywhere but nobody has ever set foot in my field!) then I'd electric tape off a bit along the side of the field for them to go, so they're totally seperate from my horses. I'd hate the thought of random people wondering amongst my animals! Surely it would then get overgrown... but hey ho not your issue and would probably stop cyclists using it if it was high in grass/weeds?
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This is what my neighbours have had to do in the field adjoining ours in order to keep bikers and dogs away from their sheep.

They have made the top stand above sheep netting electric connected to main, with notices to that effect and the fence has remained intact. We have taken a feed off it as well to power an electric tape on our side as well to stop people jumping our walls and shortcutting.

There has been a big increase in the number of bikers, and they do not care that they are on a footpath and risk running into children etc, and yes they even come up with head touches at night.
 
On a similar note at our local country park horse riders have to pay a fee each year to ride there & they also have to produce insurance that has third party cover to £5,000,000. Normal insurance has cover to £2,000,000 but the council want more. So riders are riding in the park responsibly but the mountain bikers, who don't have any fee to pay nor insurance either, charge around the paths at break neck speed & people are regularly injured by these idiots. As far as I am aware no one has been injured by horse riders. :)
 
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