Do Our Trails Need Environmental Education For All?

These trash free trails articles are fine but it's about more than not dropping litter. Its about being sensitive about where you ride and walk.

In our local park MCC and BC managed to trash a piece of ancient woodland to build 100 meters of rather tame singletrack. They were dicks so how can you expect teenagers to be any more aware?

It's about keeping your furry flea bag under control, not charging about disturbing ground nesting birds and shitting all over the place.

People need to aquire some respect for the country side there are few nice bits left.

In our local park MCC and BC managed to trash a piece of ancient woodland to build 100 meters of rather tame singletrack. They were dicks so how can you expect teenagers to be any more aware?

A while ago the council asked us not to use a particular track in the woods for fear of disturbing the otters. The stream in which the otters were meant to exist was often heavily polluted by run-off so seemed an unlikely otter hang-out, but there you go. we are only cyclists not otter experts and it was only a connecting track to get to a better trail. Around Covid time the council decided to widen the otter track and make it more accessible by pouring concrete (or cement?) and chippings along it. Several trees have now fallen because their bases were undercut by the track widening. Steps have been cut into the hillside. The track which used to only be used by the occasional person is now constantly used by dog walkers.

So much for the otters.

So, yes, I agree, if our official bodies have no respect for anything then why should anyone else even bother to carry their litter home, pick their dog mess up, have any respect at all?

Litter breeds litter. 

It's more obvious in winter due to less vegetation but have a look around any trail, any roadside verge, any riverbank and litter is *everywhere*. Roadside verges are the worst - fast food wrappers, cans, bottles, coffee cups all chucked from cars plus general debris from cars themselves like bits of hubcap, shredded tyre and broken light cluster.

I was at Sherwood Pines the other week and the flytipping out the back of the place was off the charts. Faced with seeing that, a couple of kids aren't going to care about taking their crisp packet back. Clearly a "known" spot where pick up trucks and small vans have been going for months before it was finally blocked off with big rocks and a gate but the litter is still there.

When Snake Pass was properly closed a few years ago for the first of the big landslides, the local cycle club went up and down it litter picking. They collected dozens of industrial size bin bags full and there was so much of it they didn't even get to do all the road.

Littering is less of an issue round here than people absolutely trashing the area by putting massive trench lines everywhere.

Yes I am sure it will eventually vanish once the bracken grows up,  but currently a lot of runs on heavy bikes are wrecking stuff.

It was good to see people lagging their shite at Greno the weekend, even saw couple of young peeps calling out their peers for leaving Monster cans on the deck. 

I often muse that littering which is a problem being the countryside is just a symptom of the culture of entitlement we seem to have developed. 

People just don't give a ****. 

Posted by: idlejon

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So, yes, I agree, if our official bodies have no respect for anything then why should anyone else even bother to carry their litter home, pick their dog mess up, have any respect at all?

"Official bodies" are all working on bare bones budgets, scraped together from piecemeal funding pots and used last minute. Cheapest bidder, lowest cost materials, least time possible and the work only commissioned when it absolutely has to be (which is usually a lot later than it *needs* to be).

Done properly, you could have had a sympathetic path repair done to a high standard using locally appropriate material. Done on the cheap, you get Cowboy Builders Inc turning up with some knock-off cement, tipping it onto the trail and waiting until it rains.

Posted by: Bruce

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It's about keeping your furry flea bag under control, not charging about disturbing ground nesting birds and shitting all over the place.

I expect that the "Paws on paths" signs will go up around here pretty soon. Lowland heath supports some scarce ground nesting birds so they ask that people don't let their dogs run through the undergrowth. There are signs on every single entrance gate but if you stop and ask someone if they've seen them (cos Fido is going banzai 20m away)they'll plead ignorance at best or just get aggro back at you.