From this
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to this 🙁 sad times
[url= https://c5.staticflickr.com/6/5623/30780223876_aebfa83187_b.jp g" target="_blank">https://c5.staticflickr.com/6/5623/30780223876_aebfa83187_b.jp g"/> [/img][/url][url= https://flic.kr/p/NTWGc7 ]Untitled[/url] by [url= https://www.flickr.com/photos/nzrich/ ]Richard Munro[/url], on Flickr
No way! Ah man, that's spank..
Oh no 🙁 Loved that trail.
A great blight of our age 🙁
It's hopless for walking too, I can walk on a gravel path in a city centre. Bikes will come down at higher speeds increasing conflict
As a wise Glentress trail fairy pointed out, that is supposed to weather in for a year or two, and nature will give you your trail back.
In the meantime, you may have to share your trail with other people.
😉
Glad we got to ride that before it's been sanitised. Fun little track 🙁
Its not all the way up but they could be coming back for more I think they got the FP and BW mixed up!
[url= https://c6.staticflickr.com/6/5671/30728676341_24294f9100_b.jp g" target="_blank">https://c6.staticflickr.com/6/5671/30728676341_24294f9100_b.jp g"/> [/img][/url][url= https://flic.kr/p/NPouUv ]Untitled[/url] by [url= https://www.flickr.com/photos/nzrich/ ]Richard Munro[/url], on Flickr
That plaque is not on the BW but on the FP at the bottom and they merge further on up!
So from an eroded mess to a well built path that will last. Its not just for you - its for horses and walkers as well
That's rubbish!
🙁
Who do they do this for? I guess I naively think, as a keener walker myself who has no interest walking up a santised path, that most other walkers would take the same view
So from an eroded mess to a well built path that will last
That as maybe, but aesthetically that's a butt ugly path...!
I'm sure I've ridden that in the past.
They've properly ruined it.
It would be nice if their was a consultation before they smoothed out paths/bridleways.
Bollocks!
Is that someone walking down on the left of the original photo?
Regardless, looks reasonable to me - a much more accessible path designed for the many not the few...
gutted to see this...
The DCC disease has spread to Cumbria
🙁 I've ridden that, it was ace.
Grrrrr. Awesome and easily accessible descent ruined, what a shame.
Yep give it a couple of years and that track that has lasted hundreds of years will have a nice big groove down the middle of it.
It will be ruined and require constant maintenance from the council (if they can afford it.)
Bloody stupid.
Who's the masked vigilante?
Pish.
Well the original "eroded" path has been like that (natural rocks and roots) for as long as I can remember so why the sudden need to "improve"? I presume the roots are still underneath and we'll see them again soon....
In fairness though, does this mean it is now possible to ride all the way up going to Troutbeck?
So from an eroded mess to a well built path that will last. Its not just for you - its for horses and walkers as well
That eroded mess was bedrock 🙄
And a waste of money!
Have they left any of the rock exposed higher up?
Oh, that's heart breaking. I'm so very sorry.
Anyone who thinks that is a well made surface that will last probably needs to have a geology/geography lesson..There must be a better approach to path/bridleway construction than that?
Have they left any of the rock exposed higher up?
they have done it to the tight right hander looks like they could be going further on up!
It does look like they've created a gravel drainage channel. Be interesting to see how well it lasts if the weather is in any way similar to last year.
That's just spoiling what was a lovely natural walking / fell / mtb trail 🙁
YOu can see in the top pic where the erosion has been spreading as people walk / ride further and further off the original route in an attempt to avoid the rough eroded surface. it looks to be many yards wide eroded mess.
The path construction looks very like the trails at glentress and in many other places which typically grown in the verge over a year or two as people no longer go wider and wider and last for many years.
That looks unbelievably cack.
I'll never be riding it, but I feel really sorry for everyone who's ridden it in the past and is now faced with that.
got to be honest, jenkin cragg is 1 mile from the center of one of the busiest places in the lakes. things like this are always going to happen.
people drive 2 hours to walk in the lakes, park in ambleside, walk 5 miles round the town, sit in a cafe for the rest of the day, then drive home.
loughrigg is also a prime example of this.
not nice but life goes on.
This year, I've spent a week riding in verbier in the alps and a week in the Pyrenees.
No one there feels the need to do this sort of thing to trails. Trails are for all and they're shared, but the people who use them know what they're like and use them as they are.
This micro managing of our lives gets bloody silly in this country.
The rock slowed riders down especially when wet as you had to pick a line usually around walkers, there is a footpath which runs down beside the BW that is where that crap should have been laid. Now starva merchants will hoon down that and there will be conflict! 🙁
It was only an eroded mess in the sense that any Lake District track is an eroded mess. It was solid bedrock, not that wide, easy to walk up, and as Rich says, had the effect of not allowing riders to simply blast down.
A couple of winters will see a lot of that washed out leaving a combination of bedrock and loose gravel.
I nearly rode the original a couple of months ago but went elsewhere instead. Gutted I didn't now,
Isn't that the bit which already has an "improved" alternative option anyway? So this would be gravelly and steep rather than gravelly and gradual which, you would imagine, would be what those looking at increasing access etc would be more interested in.
oh FFS. We rode that earlier this year. What a crying shame.
It might be just a few miles outside Ambleside but I really find it hard to believe that even elderly walkers come to the lake district to walk paths that look like they belong in a city park. The attraction is that it's a wild rocky landscape.
There will come a point when Ambleside stops being an MTB destination - over the years I've been riding there more and more of the sections that draw me to the place get trashed in that way. We've just come back from a Basque MTB trip where a most of the trails are "walking" paths but even on the edge of tourist towns they don't feel the need to do this to them.
So from an eroded mess
It was stable. i've ridden that at intervals over about 15 years and I don't remember it changing significantly. It was eroded, not eroding. I don't see why that's a problem
That woodland looks perfect for putting in some new lines. What's the official opinion on that and could that be something to be explored with the bodies concerned?
Making the countryside bland, boring and safe in the name of 'progress'. I thought local authorities and their ilk were struggling from a supposed chronic lack of funding, but it seems there is plenty of cash available to Wal Mart the countryside. There are so many other better ways of spending cash than this vandalism.
DCC have even given up pretending, someone posted a few weeks back about a nice track that had been destroyed with road planings - just around the corner from some roadworks. Effectively council-driven fly tipping!
I'm writing to the Tibetan government. I've always fancied climbing Everest, but I can't be arsed with the danger and difficulty, so I'm requesting a flat cinder path to be laid to the top so I can get up without having to put down my selfie stick at any point.
There will come a point when Ambleside stops being an MTB destination
Yep, that's the plan. It certainly is according to the DCC model.
what you have got to remember is that the authorities dont see places as 'mtb destinations. they want the honey pots (ambleside, keswick, grasmere, coniston and such) full of weekend car visitors, paying for carparking, filling the shops and cafes, filling the bnb places.
they dont care about a minority like mtb riders.
paths will always have to be maintained and upgraded. the paths up skiddaw and helvellyn being 2 obvious ones, walna scar another. the closer you are to these places the more the upgrades are going to be.
mybe try not riding near the busy lakes places?
Oh my god. I've just got a little bit of sick in my mouth. I...I...I'm going to cry.
Bastards!
I doubt my step daughter's powered wheelchair wouldn't have a cat in hell's chance of getting up that.
I hope all of the gates further up are made to be easily accessible too, a few years back you had to lift a few to make the latches slide
Whether the works done are the correct approach or not, hearing MTBers moaning about the ruining of a trail smacks very much of the kind of Nimbyism that we like to moan about from ramblers and horse riders.
Though I don't ride in that area, I guess it must be quite tough seeing the [u]only[/u] decent trail in a 10 mile radius reduced to chippings. 😉
You might not agree with the concept but making tracks easier to negotiate does encourage more folk to get out and to go further. Given how many are overweight and/or inactive that has to be worth a bit of investment even if it seems to "spoil" it for a few niche mountain bikers.
That path 'upgrade' makes no sense.
Access controls, ie Stiles and poorly functioning gates are nearly always a bigger obstruction to use than uneven surfaces. Start replacing stiles with easy to use gates, improve the signage then sort the surface
Theres miles of smooth cycle path and coastal walks round here, I never see the fat lazy locals on any of them.
Was a great route that either way good test of bike v trail, luckily we managed to ride them while they were still a challenge , our kids will be riding them all on shiny tarmac on road bikes ,sorry I mean electric road bikes!!
I wonder if every public right of way on National Trust land is unobstructed....
tjagain - Member
So from an eroded mess to a well built path that will last. Its not just for you - its for horses and walkers as well
Loads of bridleways where I live have deliberate obstacles placed by the local horse folk to make it more of a challenge for horse riding. Not to mention the mess they're made of by horses anyway.
I can't see many horse riders wanting to ride a smooth surface like this in this kind of location. Likewise walkers.
This is man made damage to natural countryside. If someone wanted to slap a road through there, nature campaigners would be outraged. Surprised they're not by this.
looks great - will be able to ride my E bike along it much faster 😀 😀
no, only joking, looked better before, but can see that its not as accessible to as many users
That part starts at the top of a boggin steep tarmac road, who exactly is this going to benefit? Super fit people with pushchairs maybe and visually impaired? I'm sure there must be more appropriate paths which were better candidate for improvements or as I said above dozens of stiles which could be replaced by gates which would benefit more people
Vandalism starts at 2.43
No im not having the doffed cap we've got to think of others mustn't grumble attitude. There's miles of accessible Tracks running north and west of Ambleside. This was one little bit and they've ****ed it up. It was a fantastic feature, they've tamed either side but I thought this was safe. What's the point of a trail if there's nothing to walk to? Loads of people just potter to this bit and back because it was interesting and worth walking to.
Last time I was up they had tamed to the top of the elterwater descent but not the descent itself. That's an absolute gem. I'm a bit worried now. :-/
Nobody, in any position of power within a local authority, understands MTBing in the general, trail-riding, sense of the word.
To them, MTBing is either XTreme Gnarr-Core to the max Red Bull Rampage stuff that they've seen when they've googled "mountain biking" or it's the sort of stuff they see at CenterParcs.
So they look at the first one and go "ooh no that's terrible, we can't have that, people will die / get injured / sue and it doesn't fit with our genteel lifestyle of appealing to rich old folk who want to drive up and sit in a cafe".
They look at the second one and go "ooh, yes, that's all jolly sedate and nice and friendly and harmless and appeals to our core clientele who want to drive their BMW X5 to a nice smooth car park, ride their MTBs on a nice short smooth trail then sit in a cafe and spend more money while telling everyone how much they've enjoyed The Outdoors"
They did something similar to a trail in the Peak District except they made the rare concession of asking The Nicest Man In Mountain Biking, Mr Nick Craig, him being local and all that. Nick looked horrified at their plans to gravel what was a lovely technical descent, said "don't do it, it'll be shit, it'll increase speeds, it'll cause accidents", then they ignored him, gravelled the whole thing over and a week later an MTBer got airlifted out following a high speed slide out on gravel.
****ing ****s.
first pic looks like a fun climb
Unfortunately this sort of thing has happened on tracks around Coniston through to Elterwater, the Langdales etc. Time to go and find some foothpaths to ride....
I always enjoyed riding (or running) Jenkin's Crag after work.
Seems like a pointless waste of funds.
Are they going to tarmac the uneven parts of Loughrigg next?
Good. Bloody evil trail. Binned it and bruised my hip the Greyhound Challenge on the very bit that's been done after the left hander. Tarmac the bastard I say.
Another trail goes the way of CyB...
Come on, its progress. Making it safer and more inclusive for those that may struggle.
I think it is sad, the whole idea of getting into the countryside is experiencing the natural side of it, bogs, gulleys, rocks and all. This continual creation of easy access routes hugely dilutes this. I'm amazed that with austerity as it stands, the local govt can afford it too.
For those that would struggle when the path was in it's previous state, the vast majority will still struggle to even reach the path as there's no car park at the start, just a ruddy steep road.
How many NT members on here I wonder?
Will you be renewing your membership if they keep doing things like this?
Everyones slating the council but might it not have been the national trust?
Oops, apart from the plaque proclaiming their involvement
As much as I would like exclusive use of the countryside I understand the need to share. If more accessible trails gets more people walking and riding then that will probably be for the best longer term. Having recently been on a few walks with less able bodied people the options are a bit limited and dull. Still plenty of cheeky trails out there.
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Same place back in 2005... it's certainly let itself go over the years - not
There are already plenty of accessible well-surfaced trails for walkers and riders near Ambleside - and as has been mentioned, the steep hill between this and the town would put off a lot of those who might be bothered about a rough surface.
The issue is that this is the only decent legal descent into the town from the east for a MTBer, and the highlight of quite a few published guidebook routes. Although I'll probably consider dropping off Wansfell in future and using Jenkin Crag as a climb, a lot of riders don't want to use cheek.
I don't think anyone bemoans making paths more accessible for the less able but in this instance you have to ask whether this was the best bridleway to do it on?
Mtb's will now probably use the adjacent footpath instead unless the NT think they have to restrict access to bikes and put some form of other access control in place.
The money spent here could have paid for improved access on paths more likely to get more use by less able bodied.
The biggest barrier to use of the countryside for most of the population is actually getting to the countryside in the first place, the second biggest barrier is information - when I get there where should I go where will I be able to go? what should I expect when I get there?
Putting barrow loads of gravel on a steep path at the end of a steep tarmac road I doubt will benefit a great many people that could not have previously walked the path anyway.
It's called Jenkins Crag, it should be craggy, it's now not, will it be renamed? Jenkins Lane???
The "before" pic looks little different from when I first started visiting in about 1980.
It seems odd as a priority though - after the recent floods there are many places which need to be rebuilt / repaired. For this to be done now when so many other places are in greater need of money spent on them is strange.
The NT are indeed asking for funds to repair lakes flooding [url= https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/the-lakes-appeal ]https://www.nationaltrust.org.uk/the-lakes-appeal[/url]
So why on earth are they wasting money on this?
Nowt to do with the NT, according to the plaque, although the track runs through a NT woodland.
This will be taxpayers money getting wasted, not members' money. As if Cumbria CC didn't have enough things to spend cash on. They could start by draining the small lake across the public road at the top of the Fox descent at Grizedale!
Anyone have contacts at the local council and NT to esquire about why this was done? Could be the thin end of the wedge. First Walna Scar, then Loughrigg Terrace, now Jenkin Crag. What next, Garburn Pass, Grizedale Singletrack, Nan Bield? At this rate unless something is done in another 10 years all of the classic Lakeland descents will be sanitized!!!
Surely some local paper coverage might help? Highlighting how local care for the elderly is facing drastic cuts yet £1,000's being wasted on unnecessary trail work could get some local 'non mountain biker types' on side and make the council think twice in future?
. What next, Garburn Pass
West side of Garburn has been done already.