Radical "Dudes" on downhill bikes in body armour. Hacking new (unsanctioned) trails through the woods down the side of the hill from the tower, building in jumps and such.

Guess they must have moved across from Holmbury after their unwanted efforts were trashed by the ranger and his mechanical digger.

You're not welcome. You risk all of us getting tarred with the same brush (bunch of morons chewing up protected land and screwing up the local wildlife).

Piss off.

Did you have a word with them?

Perhaps they don't know the grief they are causing?

They have been building there for a while now.
Some of the jumps look very large indeed.

Seem to be nice guys when we came across them
and they was not chopping trees down.

Theres no Downhillers in Holmbury in Pitch Hill yes
but only us Hard Core Trail riders in Holmbury mate.

seems the Ranger was using it has a reason to demolish what
was not causing a problem.

Maybe you need to have a chat with the Rangers about the Barbed
wire been placed along the bottom section of Summer Lightning
On the top of wired fence

As far as I am aware that fence has had barbed wire on it for years.

Holmbury Hill is part of a larger area known as "The Hurtwood". It is privately owned. To avoid any build-up of the problems being experienced between mountain bikers, horse riders and walkers due to the congestion of this ever-more popular area which was beginning to generate confrontation and other problems, local riders got together with the owners of this PRIVATE LAND and joined the "Friends of Hurtwood Control" so that our reasonable voice could be heard.

After a great deal of selfless effort on all sides, the result has been that known trails are now maintained and all comfortably share the area.

The Bray family are keen to encourage use of their land by all comers, but will (quite reasonably so) not tolerate more trail digging in sensitive woodland, leading to the destruction of pristine countryside, or the risk of entertaining uninsured activity on their land amongst other things, by ignorant **** like you who seem to think you're somehow outside of all this and can do exactly what you please.

If you came and built trails in my back garden and ploughed up the lawn, frankly I'd deck you before having you arrested.

Like I said – you're not welcome. Piss off.

frankly I'd deck you before having you arrested.

And quite rightly end up in a lot more bother 😆

LOL quite rightly so
But for what I had seen they have not dug up a 15 feet drop or cut down 300 mm thick
tree trunks to make the jumps but do collect from what the rangers cut down.

LOL been riding there for years and know the history very well
Just a shame there still going to dig for oil, Gutted about that.

Not sure if the Holmbury ranger and Leith Hill issues should be mixed up. As you point out Holmbury is private land (albeit with a *lot* of footpaths / bridle ways going through it, they'd have a problem buttoning it up) but Leith Hill is on National Trust land (correct me if i'm wrong).

Note i'm not saying I agree with people building new trails on either, but the two are not really related as they're under different management regimes.

Just to play devils advocate for a second, the trails that are now 'sanctioned' on Holmbury/Pitch had to be built orginally – they were unsacntioned at that point. That said, building near the tower is pretty silly.

But it is not very close to the Tower, and not near any foot paths etc way out of the way.
Now that I would agree with and yes your very right about land ownership.

Could always go and build in the bit of woodland to the west of pitch hill…. that's owned by an (apparently) grumpy south african who likes to let the dogs on bikers. No access rights to loose there!

Having a family / individual / organisation own a massive tract of land like that is a complete load of b0ll0cks anyway, esp somewhere as populated as the south east. You've got to wonder who did they f over at some point to get hold of it all (be it 10 years or 150 years ago). That is possibly a different discussion tho!

The Leith Hill ranger is as upset about illegal trail building without permission on his patch (owned by the NT) as is the Holmbury ranger about the same on HIS patch.

The two situations are exactly the same in all but location.

It is to the credit of the Bray family that they allowed the existing trails to not only continue, but be improved and maintained by a hard working core of volunteers. This decision was helped by the involvement of responsible local bikers who were prepared to put their money and time where their mouths are and join in for the common good of all.

There really is no excuse. What makes it worse is that the numb-nuts who are doing this are costing time and other people's money putting their unwelcome intrusions beyond use – it's not as if this subject hasn't been discussed ad neauseum on this very forum so they can't claim ignorance. Especially the Kona Stinky-riding father of one of the younger members who really should know better at his (presumably adult) age. They're draining charitable donations that are intended for the upkeep of existing acreage for all sorts of reasons that are nothing to do with mountain biking.

They're putting at risk all the hard work done to make accommodations on all sides by all involved to keep the hills MTB-friendly.

Bunch of selfish, thoughtless dicks, basically.

The bottom line is it causes problems for the majority when it's discovered. I've been riding the Surrey Hills since 1989 and it's taken that long to get a nice system going that suits everyone. There is a jump spot near the tower anyway and the quarry is also there. It's better to go through the right channels if you want to build than to do what you like or isn't that "hardcore". Trails like Barry's and the others are there through consultation and I expect with a bit of talking these guys may be allowed to build something they like. It's worth noting that we are not alone up there, walkers, families and what have you all use the place too and need to be safe while they do so.

"Having a family / individual / organisation own a massive tract of land like that is a complete load of b0ll0cks anyway, esp somewhere as populated as the south east."

I rest my case.

How's that then? You've said nothing to refute the argument.

Personally I don't agree with building more trails on Leith or hurtwood (see devil and advocate above), but I do happen to think it's a bunch of arse that something that should clearly be a community resource can be controlled by the whim of one person or family. Which is exactly the situation on hurtwood.

There is no reason why the Hurtwood should be a "community resource". The situation as it is, is perfectly fine. The land is maintained and beautiful. It's open to all. The owners like us, we like the owners. Everybody's happy.

Kindly take your little kiddy revolutionary playpen and shove it.

Well the family at Hurtwood are more than happy to have MTB all over their land, asking that new trails are requested rather than just built seems reasonable to me. Leith is National Trust and full of wildlife so it's best to check what you're building is OK first. I've seen people cross the firebreaks at full tilt scaring people and once almost taking out my son when we were walking up there. As you can imagine I was more than a little pissed off with that stupid c***.

Pardon my French.

.

Kindly take your little kiddy revolutionary playpen and shove it.

Well I stand corrected that's an entirely mature well thought out response, have you always been a **** or do you practice?

The point is that should the owners have a change of heart we'd be fked, wouldn't we? If you can come up with a decent argument as to why in a country with 61 million people in it, one single family should control 3000 acres of country side i'd be more than happy to change my mind and stand corrected. But I suspect you can't.

Just because you don't agree with my point, doesn't make it any less correct.

Mr Woppit

There really is no excuse – it's not as if this subject hasn't been discussed ad neauseum on this very forum so they can't claim ignorance. Especially the Kona Stinky-riding father of one of the younger members who really should know better at his (presumably adult) age.

Did it ever occur to you that they may not all frequent this website? Believe it or not there isn't much in the way of downhill content on here.

Why don't you stop being a keyboard warrior and go call them selfish thoughtless dicks to their face and tell them to piss off. Go on. Let us know how that pans out.

NT only have certain sections of land on Leith hill. The area where the jumps are being built I do believe belongs to the Wotton estate. The nearest NT land is the open land around the tower.

As for Holmbury, you may request to build trails, but the answer will be no. It has been clearly stated that any new unsanctioned trails will be put beyond use.

seems the Ranger was using it has a reason to demolish what
was not causing a problem.

That is a typical response from someone who doesn't understand the potential liabilities involved, not to mention that there is the wildlife to consider and of course shockingly it's not just a playground for mountainbikers other users use the land as well.

Swinley has lots of jump trails and is easy to get to if that's your thing. Surrey hills is what it is and should be treated with some respect.

Out of interest how could a trail be sanctioned over there?

They frequent.

"Why don't you stop being a keyboard warrior and go call them selfish thoughtless dicks to their face and tell them…": Don't be ridiculous, what are you nuts? They might hurt me. It's much safer here.

Maybe you could deliver the message for me. I'm sure it wouldn't worry you at all, being as how you're so tough, like…

Ewan: I can't think of one decent reason why one family shouldn't own that piece of land, given their expertise at it's upkeep and community-spirited attitude. I can't imagine what would become of it being run by the type of "people's committee" that you evidently prefer. Possibly a John Prescott-style "we will never build on the green belt" newtown.

Just because you think you're right, it doesn't mean that you are.

Er, comrade…

Ewan, the Hurtwood Control is not just managing land on behalf of the Bray family – it does so on behalf of other landowners as well.

Frankly, you don't seem to know what you're talking about, which is a bit of a shame, eh? I'd suggest you have a chat to Hurtwood Control – you know, get some primary evidence to make your mind up. That said, here's a brief potted history:

The Brays opened their land *voluntarily* to the public in the 1920s, and have always tried to manage it for the benefit of the public ever since. This is one of the reasons why we have such incredibly good access on the Hurtwood. As has been pointed out above, you should compare and contrast the freedoms we have there with what goes on on other bits of land like the Wooton Estate, MoD land and Crown Estates land.

One reason why the owners may have a change of heart is if – and this has been stated explicitly – one group of users starts inconveniencing the others. Three years ago, the Hurtwood had a meeting, and invited all mountain bikers with an interest in the area to attend. They said there that mountain biking was very welcome on the Hurtwood, but that it was starting to have a deleterious effect on other users of the land – horse riders, walkers and everyone else. They would rather not have to do anything that prevented mountain bikers having their fun, so they wanted to work with local riders and trail builders to create a situation that was equitable for everyone.

Basically, if we carry on with the '**** you, got mine' approach you are talking about, where we as a group don't take into account what anyone else wants, as a user group we are absolutely screwed.

What's going on on the Hurtwood is being watched by all of the other landowners around this area to see how it works out. If it works well, then there's a really good chance that we'll get a similar deal to what we've got at the moment on the Hurtwood. If it doesn't, well, it's back to square one.

By the way – land ownership on Leith Hill: It's patches of land. Some is privately owned, some is owned by the National Trust, some is owned by the Forestry Commission. The patch that Summer Lightning and the other Four Redlands Trails trails are built on is owned by FC. Other patches are leased by FC.

There are also numerous SSSIs dotted around Leith Hill, and a lot of recently – introduced wild cattle that are grazing the land back to its pre-war state.

Finally, Ewan – if you want some contacts at the NT or Hurtwood to talk to, then drop me a line. That might be a bit better than putting words in their mouth based on something someone once told you.

" bent_udder – Member "

Yes. And with that I exit stage left, pursued by a bear.

Nightnight all.

:o*

At least bother to read what i'm saying, eh? Note from the above, I'm not advocating the building of any more trails on Leith or Holmbury hill.

I do actually know what i'm talking about, i'm fully versed on the ins and outs of the hurtwood control issue and have been for years. I've even been on one of the trail building days. Just to be clear I don't have a problem with the bray family per say, or how they're choosing to run the hurtwood.

My point was a more general one, I think think it's all well and good that this landowner has chosen (to their credit) to use the land for the good of everyone. However should the ownership change of a large tract of land then it's as likely as not that the access to it will change – this can be for the better or worse. Community ownership of large areas of country side would at least negate that to some degree, at the very least it'd give the people who use it some degree of legal control.

As far as I can see, short of someone buying the land with the money you get from a Nobel prize, someone has to have screwed someone else in order to own thousands of acres of land. Be it 10 years ago when they made a killing at the stockmarket, or be it 1000 years ago when they killed a bunch of peasants and were made a Baron by the king. The bigger the tract of land the bigger the screwing that was adminstrated. That is my point. Clearly i'm being a bit of an idealist here, but I think it's fundementally unfair for one person to own such a large piece of land.

Call me a communist if you want, but there you go.

Bentudder – what words have I placed in the mouths of NT or Hurtwood? Please point out where i've been factually incorrect?

Ooh, Woppit, you big stirrer.

😀

Its a great trail that.. 😀

Ewan, you don't seem to be *that* well versed, and to top it all, you also seem to be confusing me with MrWoppit, bless his hand knitted woolen sleepysocks.

You're arguing that the Hurtwood should be communal land. That would not allow us the same access rights as we enjoy now. If you look at communal, or as it's better known, Common land, then rights of access are governed by existing Rights or Way laws. So we'd not have had access in the first place.

At the moment the land is *owned* by a variety of owners, including the Bray estate. It is *managed* by a charitable trust. You need to separate ownership from management first. FC and NT own and manage land. They sometimes lease and manage land. Hurtwood Control is a very different kettle of fish.

but I do happen to think it's a bunch of arse that something that should clearly be a community resource can be controlled by the whim of one person or family. Which is exactly the situation on hurtwood.

Again: 'The family' don't control Rights of Way on the Hurtwood – including other peoples' land. By concentrating ownership, they have – oddly – created a way of opening up access for walkers, horse riders and cyclists to go off those RoWs and roam.

Of course, if you'd rather that didn't happen, then that's cool. English Heritage – about as close as we can get to communal ownership – had a very simple solution to the problem of Parklife going over a scheduled ancient monument – shut the entire thing down. Rather than doing that, the Trust asked that it be rerouted. A bunch of us helped do that. Strangely enough, the Trust isn't made up of capitalist running dogs. It's made up of pretty normal people and even a couple of mountain bikers.

However should the ownership change of a large tract of land then it's as likely as not that the access to it will change – this can be for the better or worse. Community ownership of large areas of country side would at least negate that to some degree, at the very least it'd give the people who use it some degree of legal control.

I think we've just agreed that communal ownership does not automatically equal better land management. Maybe back in the dim distant past, someone in the Bray family screwed someone or a bunch of people over to get the land. That shouldn't really be held against the current owners, should it?

Worrying about whether such a huge chunk of land ownership is a good thing or not is a bit pointless; it is what it is, and at times it has brought a great deal of good to the local community. Still waiting for an explanation of why it's been, or will be, particularly bad.

Oh, and the offer's still open, Ewan – email in my profile. I'll even buy the pints in the Star if you want to chat it over face to face.

I'm sure we can keep doing this, but you're still applying my general point to a specific instance (Hurtwood). If every piece of land in Britain was run in the way that Hurtwood was then I'm sure i'd be less stuck in my argument. But it's not. A good example is the bit of land to the west of hurtwood, the ones behind the ridiculously formal gates, run by the bloke who chases people off his land.

Ewan, you don't seem to be *that* well versed, and to top it all, you also seem to be confusing me with MrWoppit, bless his hand knitted woolen sleepysocks.

I wouldn't wish that on anyone.

You're arguing that the Hurtwood should be communal land. That would not allow us the same access rights as we enjoy now. If you look at communal, or as it's better known, Common land, then rights of access are governed by existing Rights or Way laws. So we'd not have had access in the first place.

I wasn't acutally advocating turning it into Common land. The arrangement i'd like would be quite simular to the way that Hurtwood (as a specific example) is run, i.e managed by a community of users.

At the moment the land is *owned* by a variety of owners, including the Bray estate. It is *managed* by a charitable trust. You need to separate ownership from management first. FC and NT own and manage land. They sometimes lease and manage land. Hurtwood Control is a very different kettle of fish.

Again this is a specific instance. Not all land is run in the same way is it? And even in this instance if the owners had a change of heart and chose to stop working with the Hurt Wood Control Trust they could shut down every trail that isn't a ROW as quick as they like. That's the bit I don't like, it's like the sword of damocles – all it'd take is some really agressive illegal trail building (and maybe a resultant death) and it could all go, despite all the hard work and good will built up over the years by people such as yourself and Redlands.

I think we've just agreed that communal ownership does not automatically equal better land management. Maybe back in the dim distant past, someone in the Bray family screwed someone or a bunch of people over to get the land. That shouldn't really be held against the current owners, should it?

Completely agree with not holding anything against the current owners of hurtwood, I think i've been pretty clear in my previous posts to say that I don't have any problem with the Bray family (or hurtwood control for that matter). Again my *general* point is that not all large land owners are as fair, so the best solution would be to remove that ownership from everyone. Or just apply the Scottish system of go where you like (pretty much) but don't cause any damage.

Worrying about whether such a huge chunk of land ownership is a good thing or not is a bit pointless; it is what it is, and at times it has brought a great deal of good to the local community. Still waiting for an explanation of why it's been, or will be, particularly bad.

Well this is the internet, surely the home of pointless debates. I can't think of a better place to a) wind Mr Woppit up and b) make a philosophical point than the STW forum.

Or just apply the Scottish system of go where you like (pretty much) but don't cause any damage.

No right to build trails under "right to roam" and very little chance of legal trail / jump building anyway – unless you get the owners consent.

You could ride footpaths tho, which would more than compensate I suspect.

Fair dos, Ewan. 🙂

The bloke with the gates and the dogs is also involved in Hurtwood, by the way.

Ben, a beer down the star sounds like a cracking idea, Wednesday evening?

Didn't realise that about the guy with the dogs. What's his take on the whole thing then? From what i've 'heard' (hearsay I guess!) he's pretty anti bike / anyone on his land.

yeah, his woodland that used to have loads of singletrack (and may have had some more recent stuff built in:)), has recently been clear felled and thinned in other sections.

Not much left now

Mr Woppit I can't tell what your real problem is? Is it the building of unsanctioned trails? Or is it that you don't have the minerals to try some of the gaps?

I ride those trails and they are some of the best in the North Downs. The people who build them obviously know how to ride and build a decent trail; even if they are a little unsustainable.

I've met the riders that built them and a majority are just young lads looking to build some more interesting trails than already exist on Leith Hill. Why do you think coming onto this forum and telling them they're not welcome and 'to piss off' is going to change anything?

The fact that they go to the effort of building all of this, and they've shifted some dirt to make some of the features, means they are willing to work on the trails (how much building have you done recently?). If it's such a problem why not work with them. They won't stab you for talking to them. Unless of course you approach them with the same attitude displayed above. Sure go ahead, make a fuss, if the jumps and trails are ploughed they will turn up somewhere else, guaranteed.

How do you think the UK has so many world-class downhillers? The likes of Brendan Fairclough didn't make it to where he is cause he rode Summer lightning and BKB a few times.

Why don't you take your brainsquawk somewhere else.

Davef – yep – planning on being there with Mark C on Wednesday evening.

R979 – not many world class downhillers from Surrey, I'm afraid. Natural features like huge hills are notably lacking. If you're one of the builders, please drop me a line – my email's in my profile – as we do need to talk, regardless of what you think of BKB or SL. 😀

but I think it's fundementally unfair for one person to own such a large piece of land.

As my Mum would say – life's unfair!

So what should be done about it? Nationalise it?