Interesting watch on what’s becoming a hot topic for all of us with increased pressure on local riding spots.

This is in Scotland, the land of the enlightened seemingly. Can’t see this happening in England.

Coffee is on, biscuits are open.

Dis gon be fun.

This is in Scotland, the land of the enlightened seemingly. Can’t see this happening in England.

Just remember, the laws around criminal damage and landowner liabilities are the same.

biscuits are open.

Highland Shortbread in a twee tartan tin?

FWIW this is England, and has just been rebuilt recently, not on some inaccessible hillside in Scotland, on the edge of town, within about 20 minutes ride of a quarter of a million people (landowners permission sought, trail association setup, t-shirts sold to pay for liability insurance, trails that I’ll never be able to ride built).

https://www.instagram.com/foxhilltrails/?hl=en

Also, had a Pizza Oven for max STW points.

https://www.instagram.com/p/ByA-94MHUlN/

If folks builds trails on somebody else’s land and then break themselves on it, who gets sued?

Highland Shortbread in a twee tartan tin?

Once again showing your immense understanding of those of us fortunate enough not to live in a MTB backwater 🙂

Actually, that was really good, I’ve been critical of DMBinS in the past, but they’re definitely coming onto a game these days, Graeme came across very well in that video. I’m gonna contact them, there’s a local spot that could do with some organisation like that in the vid, instead of loads of us building our own stuff.

Good stuff, cheers for posting Kayak.

Once again showing your immense understanding of those of us fortunate enough not to live in a MTB backwater 🙂

As an English person, can I employ the Edinborough Defense?

MTB backwater? It may be flat as a pancake gravel riding out the door, but I’ve got the Chilterns to the north, Thames Basin Heaths and the Army ranges to the south and beyond those the Surrey Hills. We don’t do too badly.

Unfortunately, our biscuit factory closed down. But we did get a velodrome out of it.

If folks builds trails on somebody else’s land and then break themselves on it, who gets sued?

If you built the trail and you break yourself, the vast vast majority of burden remains with you. So a court could award you paying yourself.

However the landowner could if it was proven they ignored, allowed or encouraged trails to be built could retain some liability, proportional to how much the encouraged vs resisted.

If you build a trail, and someone else breaks themselves….then it can get even more complex.

IANAL

Agreed, it can get more complex but the initial starting point is the landowner…which is why so many of them aren’t entirely keen on allowing a free reign and blank canvas – which makes sense.

He’s hit the nail on the head although it was a bit understated, my feeling is the only* stuff that gets officially allowed in England is ‘family friendly’ trails.
Nothing seems to be allowed officially to get built to challenge experienced good riders.
Hence all the unsanctioned building.
Fortunately, quite a lot seems tolerated, but then it only lasts so long until too many people find it, start doing more digging, social media, litter, dangerous stuff, and it gets stamped down for a couple of years until it creeps back in.

However the landowner could if it was proven they ignored, allowed or encouraged trails to be built could retain some liability, proportional to how much the encouraged vs resisted.

IANAL and there may be a difference between England and Scotland, but that seems to be the case for things that are built on the land for other purposes. Whether it applies to a MTB rider who already knows the risks of MTB riding, I’m not sure:

Occupiers’ Liability (Scotland) Act 1960

Nothing in the foregoing provisions of this Act shall be held to impose on an occupier any obligation to a person entering on his premises in respect of risks which that person has willingly accepted as his

it only lasts so long until too many people find it, start doing more digging, social media, litter, dangerous stuff, and it gets stamped down for a couple of years until it creeps back in.

Yes. There’s been a lot more threads on here recently I’ve noticed asking where the ‘off-piste’ stuff is in certain areas.
These places cannot cope with trail centre traffic and will get lost unfortunately if not guarded to a degree.

It’s not hard to figure out where cheeky stuff might be if you’ve got some common sense. Folks are too lazy to figure stuff out themselves. To ask on a public forum and to have people freely giving that info unfortunately can mean the end of fantastic trails that locals put an awful lot into.

I can’t imagine we’ll ever have the progressive attitude to the outdoors in England as you lot in Scotland enjoy unfortunately.

Plus let’s not forget Cathro’s admitted carelessness of building through a medieval village. There’s often ‘buried’ reasons why landowners may not welcome random trail builders with open arms

in respect of risks which that person has willingly accepted as his

A lot get’s made of features having to be visible (and often rollable). I.e. no blind drops after a corner. I presume that’s where the liability creeps in.

A walker should watch where they’re putting their feet, that doesn’t mean the Rad Freeridewalking trail builders are allowed to put tiger pits into the walking trails to keep things interesting for advanced walkers.

I can’t imagine we’ll ever have the progressive attitude to the outdoors in England as you lot in Scotland enjoy unfortunately.

There’s a ying for every yang, but don’t forget that a lot of legal trails in England started off in exactly the same way (Swinley, Dalby, Stainburn, Guisborough, Cannock, etc). And a lot of places have semi-tolerated trail building (Surrey Hils).

The issue as you said isn’t so much differences in landowner attitudes or laws more that in England the land generally isn’t FC so there isn’t one blanket policy so each discussion with a landowner has to start from scratch.

And population/number of riders. Might be an urban myth, but it’s a believable one. When the “off piste” trails got flattened at Swinley and replaced by a trail center, it had more traffic in the opening weekend than Glentress had in a year. The sheer number of mountain bikers in England Vs Scotland means your 1 in a million chances of an accident hapen a lot more frequently.

Plus let’s not forget Cathro’s admitted carelessness of building through a medieval village. There’s often ‘buried’ reasons why landowners may not welcome random trail builders with open arms

This is very true.

I know even sanctioned trails (Greenrigg/Callander House) for example were routed directly through a significant area of rare mushrooms because even the landowner forgot!

On unsanctioned it can be terrible – we have a tiny area of woodland (20mx150m) in a local field here where all the tree roots have been cut to allow for greater size of ‘dip’ between jumps. The trees will be dead within a year or two and and I am sure fall on the trails in high wind. I have even spoken to some of the kids doing it – they just shrug and carry on…I am sure there will be tears when it all comes crashing down.

Plus let’s not forget Cathro’s admitted carelessness of building through a medieval village. There’s often ‘buried’ reasons why landowners may not welcome random trail builders with open arms

I’m sure it’s not great to ride over a medieval village – but it does look like FLS had no qualms about planting a few rows of trees through the middle of it. That must disrupt it much more than any bike trail.

Euain, bang on, FLS can’t really claim any moral high ground there. I’m all for doing it right if possible as Ben has now done, but FLS are responsible for more vandalism all around here than any biker ever will be.

They are…but they are also the landowner and a government body so rules for them (or less rules) and rules for everyone else that makes everything that isn’t done by the landowner as wrong.

(it will be a bit more nuanced than that, but that is the basic thing)

…and let us also remember that FLS have changed approaches to forestry over the 90 odd years of their existence. IIRC, 1970’s and 80’s saw huge chemical spraying, prior to that we had the huge, square monobloc planting method, before that all sorts of odd tree species choices (etc.)

The stumps on show in the Cathro medieval village are at least 30(?) years old, if they are the prior plant possibly 60 or even 70 years old. Different times.

I’m sure it’s not great to ride over a medieval village – but it does look like FLS had no qualms about planting a few rows of trees through the middle of it. That must disrupt it much more than any bike trail.

I’m guessing from the clearing that they found it when putting the trees in / harvesting and since then avoided it?

Same with Caesars Camp at Swinley. Loads of digging there, until one day someone turned around and figured out the name was actually because it was a roman fort and perhaps shouldn’t be dug up for trails 🤣

Same with Caesars Camp at Swinley. Loads of digging there, until one day someone turned around and figured out the name was actually because it was a roman fort and perhaps shouldn’t be dug up for trails 🤣

*bronze age fort incorrectly named caesars camp because they did not beleive the pre-invasion natives had the knowledge or wherewithall to build the thing.

I’m sorry but having a go at the landowner without seemingly understanding what a scheduled monument is or the responsibilities around scheduling is part of the reason why mountain bikers get a bad name.

Damaging a scheduled monument is an offence as is carrying out work without consent however there is no requirement for maintenance and while the video wasn’t really focused on showing the monument it seemed to show a clearing. I’d also expect the grass covering is there because it provides some protection.

Lets not let that stop you having a go at FLS for a bikers ignorance though

*bronze age fort incorrectly named caesars camp because they did not beleive the pre-invasion natives had the knowledge or wherewithall to build the thing.

I stand corrected, said the man in orthopedic leather sandals on Hadrians wall

Scheduled monument you say? 😉

[url=https://flic.kr/p/fv3SF]C2C2006039[/url] by Matt Robinson, on Flickr

I’m sorry but having a go at the landowner without seemingly understanding what a scheduled monument is or the responsibilities around scheduling is part of the reason why mountain bikers get a bad name.

I’m not sure anyone’s having a go at the landowner about the interaction with Ben or saying that we should have free-reign because FLS do more damage.

I queried whether planting a load of trees (and the ploughing etc. associated with that) was more damaging than riding. It’s been pointed out that they are more aware now than when these were likely planted 40 years ago or whatever. I guess we don’t know whether FLS would put off planting over the site if they wanted the timber.

I can’t see anything in the topic that is in danger of giving mountain bikers a bad name. Quite the opposite – seems everyone is in agreement that trail associations and good relations with land owners are good things.

And then you have this fantasist… Lee Hadley and his totally imaginary ‘Birmingham Bike Park’.

https://youtu.be/IW7If3-yFss

Brakes into bends, skids – basically can’t ride responsibly.

I know it’s really common at the moment, but I can’t really grasp how people would be so audacious as to turn up on land that you don’t own and hack it about with spades, picks and saws without asking to first. Forestry Commission land I can almost accept since it’s public land but, especially in places like Pitlochry, there are enough decent trails about without building new ones.

I can’t really grasp how people would be so audacious as to turn up on land that you don’t own and hack it about with spades, picks and saws without asking to first

Isn’t that how most land came to be owned by people in the first place? 😉

Exactly.

If folks builds trails on somebody else’s land and then break themselves on it, who gets sued?

In real life? Nobody gets sued in the vast majority of cases.

there are enough decent trails about without building new ones.

We’ve local ‘trail builders’ who clearly have about three rides a year.

Then their mates have to build a better trail right next door, because ‘my trail’.

Then they get bored and want bigger, better, more impressive, gnar.

Repeat around a few folk and ‘trail building’ has become it’s own activity around here.

Ben mentions FLS being sued for “millions” in the video. Is there an way to find out how much they actually paid out in damages and how much it actually cost them to fight the cases?

Round my way there seems to be 2 types of builders…

1) The ones over at Bardon Quarry making several massive jump lines, which is way above my skill level that’s for sure.  Built without permission but everything looks reasonably well built.  Still might get pulled down in the near future as the landowner isn’t massively happy apparently, either due to risk/accidents or complaints from other users, they do drop out onto a multiuse track at the bottom.

2) Kids in woods making shitty little tracks in the bluebells with pits behind lips and berms constructed from sticks, leaving lucuzade sport bottles everywhere, i.e. standard Trail Police submissions https://www.instagram.com/trail.police/ .

Ben mentions FLS being sued for “millions” in the video. Is there an way to find out how much they actually paid out in damages and how much it actually cost them to fight the cases?

FoI?

Might not be something they’d tell you as it might have NDA’s attached to it. Otherwise, the next person can phone up, say they’ve cracked a fingernail on some medieval wall, and ask for the previous amount -1p knowing they’ll settle at that figure.

Have I picked this up right? Ben Cathro started building the trail, naively thinking it wasn’t an issue, found out it was, then carried on regardless?

Not quite, I think that’s the point he shat his breeks and contacted DMBinS and they helped get him in touch with Tay group, and they went from there? least that’s the way I read it.

https://www.bikecorris.co.uk/journal/2021/5/7/wild-trails-in-wales

This just popped up on my Facebook feed…

That poor 1300s settlement. They moved all the wall stones and now we will never make sense of it. We lost some coal fragments and a sword chape. Damn shame.

I liked the bit where he said “cut the branches flush to the tree” while the video shows him cutting a branch really not at all flush to the tree.

I think this is excellent.  Not going into specifics, but I’m pretty sure that if a bit of give and take was employed and people could look beyond their own personal satisfaction,  we could open up so much more stuff for riders in loads of places.  A lot of the time advocacy is just getting the landowners on side after something has gone wrong, before it’s had a chance to go right.