All it highlights is just how out-of-date pretty much all our countryside access laws are! I mean, having banned 4x4s from pretty much 99% of the off orad network, people are now surprised that drivers of these vehicles (and mountain bikers too) are taking to “illegal” trails instead……..
(not to mention the fact that the vast majority of people seem to think that “muddy” is equivalent to “destroyed” (the so called “chocolate box” countrysiders as i call them (who generally live in the town and like to drive out to perfectly manicured parts of the countryside in their cars, and go for a short walk making sure their inappropriate shoes don’t get muddy) For example, take the Ridgeway in Oxfordshire, how muddy do you think that was in say 1650, when it was used to move 150,000 cattle and sheep a year between market towns??)