Alas mboy they have done a fair bit of Health and Safetying over the years. When I was a kid you could sit on pretty much any hedge, top of bus shelter etc within reason. Nowadays you can hardly get anywhere, though a quite tragic accident a few years back in which a few spectators died no doubt fuelled this.
To be fair, I can kind of agree with that, as when spectators begin to spoil the show (as they did with Grp B rallying) something has to be done, as they make it more dangerous than it needs to be by adding distractions. Put it this way, a TT rider comes off his bike, crashes and is killed, the Daily Mail set will say "another stupid biker dies, no big loss"... A TT rider crashes into a load of spectators, killing several of them, the Daily Mail set would have a field day, calling for the immediate closure of the race!
The spectators of Grp B rallying really killed it in the 80's, by being too selfish and trying to get too close. I'd have hated to be a driver with people in my way until I was less than 10 metres away as it would have ruined my concentration, and made everything needlessly dangerous. Same goes for the TT spectators IMO. Though that the course itself has not been sanitised at all for the riders over the years, is exactly how it should be...
