http://www.dailyecho.co.uk/news/9623004.Fine_rogue_cyclists__say_conservationists/r/?ref=twt&utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=twitter

Maureen Holding said: “I’m not anticycling but I’m very anti the type of cycling that takes place in the Forest.”

So you are just anti cycling in the new forest then.

So if anyone asks you for your name just M Holding.

Cash payment there and then, sieze your bike if you don’t pay, take your registration details….. I wouldn’t like to be the warden enforcing it though, out in the sticks with no powers.

Cash payment there and then, sieze your bike if you don’t pay, take your registration details

Under what right? I thought only a police officer could forcibly take goods?

surely it would need to be the police to actually detain you?

“even at night”

🙄

Thank goodness I live in scotchland.

I doubt Maureen gets out in the forest very much anyway:
http://www.newforest.gov.uk/index.cfm?articleid=3839

surely it would need to be the police to actually detain you?

The police will not be patrolling bridleways and footpaths in the forest.

“Planning Development Control Committee”
I bet that was a dream job for her, ” i don’t like it so NO!”

They’d take an imprint of your teeth.

possibly an impression. grammar pedants please wade in to clarify

Based purely on the picture I’m not entirely sure she’s always been a woman

Don’t they just scan the barcode on your neck?

She sure is an interrresting lady:

”About Me”

I think her “what I would like to see” section is more telling

Nothing, nobody, never. Not in MY forest

Did anyone else click on her photo? ARGH! 😯

Right so we are saying we can just ride wherever we like and do what we want and damn the consequences

When I say we I dont of course mean those MXers on motorbikes who ignore and flout the law they are menace

Last thread like this someone admitted to riding wherever they pleases on a SSSI ….is it really any wonder people dislike us?

Thank god we have established she is not a looker eh thats the spirit lads 🙄

leaving trails in their wake and causing disturbance to flora and fauna.

Some people will worry about anything. 😆

Thank god we have established she is not a looker

You can say that again

You can say that again

Thank god we have established she is not a looker

Round here the park rangers enforce it with a badge and gun. I narrowly escaped a $50 ticket last year for riding the wrong way on a one way trail. Luckily the ranger was busy arguing with a lady who’s dog was off the lead and decided to let me go with a warning.
Good old land of the free!

Her address:-

She seems to have half of Hampshire in her garden.

her looks not withstanding this does seem to be turning into a bit of a witch hunt.

I thought only a police officer could forcibly take goods?

You’d be surprised how many people can take stuff off you – often the Police will work with local authoriy officers as they can get in places and legitimately take stuff that the Police cannot. The Police have surprisingly few powers compared to people who work for the council. It all depends who has the authority, but I’d doubt if the Police would be invested or even interested with it. Most likely some poor park ranger or warden would enforce this type of thing. Such enforcement if it were to be implemented would start off with a warning in any case – good old peer pressure and voluntary compliance.

http://www.thisislondon.co.uk/news/london/50-onthespot-fines-for-cycling-on-the-footpaths-in-royal-parks-7599967.html

So that’s a bit of cheeky around Richmond Park under threat – and my cyclocross warm up in Bushey Park under threat…as I think this will be applied to any part of the park that is not specifically designated for cycling…….

….cue postings of the parkie from Viz magazine please….

Damn you DezB my funny bone is making me smirk but my sense of moral outrage is fighting it [ shakes fist whilst smirking]

😀

Junky, agreed that personal bitching about her looks etc is unreasonable and irrelevant but there appears to be a concerted effort lately from “the likes of her” to demonise NF mountain bikers. Yes, they ride on areas where access is not permitted – because there is virtually no permitted access. Horse riders can go ANYWHERE in the forest, not just on trails; they can trample as many SSSIs and ground-nesting birds as they like. Why, because they were there in 1876, rather than because they do less damage or have more reason to be there

As I whined in a previous thread:

The areas of the forest that are truly turned to full-on Somme status, are that way because of the passage of either heavy forestry vehicles or large numbers of hooved animals (or both).

I don’t question the necessity/right of either to be there, but trying to blame cyclists for any of the significant damage is just ridiculous.

Anyone who cycles in there regularly knows to avoid the very boggy areas – they’re soul destroying on a good day – so behaviour of a group of (possibly) one-off race attendees should not be extrapolated to what will become regular habit.

What confuses me (and seems to confirm that they are stuck in the victorian era) is that its perfectly ok for ponies to munch their way through stuff, horses to trample and churn the trails and walkers to wander about carte blanche, why is there such a bloody fuss about a few cyclists?
We do less damage if ridden responsibly, yet there are probably far less of us in the forest at any one time than the horsy brigade.

What Bigyinn said, it’s discrimination is what it is, pure and simple, bloody cycle-ists.

oh hang on that’s not right.

fines!! don’t make me laugh got stopped by a park ranger here in colchester i was riding on a legal trail which runs through a ssi tried to say that i wasn’t allowed to ride on the trail i pointed out i was he said that he could seize my bike and fine me i pointed out we were in the middle of nowhere and that i was going to ride off and he could feel free to run after me if he wanted funnily enough didn’t chase after me 😉

cheers scaredypants some actual facts
Ok I agree it makes no sense

@crankinirish
Where were you riding?

demonise NF mountain bikers.

did they have mountain bikes in the 70s?

NF means something very different to New Forest to some of us.

I recently moved away from that area after living there for about 5 years due to my wife’s job. I must say I don’t miss it. Not only is the riding pretty uninteresting, but I was always aware of all the bad feeling towards cyclists.

It is very rare that you come across people who object to you cycling where you shouldn’t, mainly because there is no one about to see you.

As a result the bad feeling towards cyclists that is wiped up by ‘these people’ seems to manifest itself when you are riding where it is permitted.

I hope I never have to live round there again.

@10 Jefferson County Colorado

It won’t happen. To be a legally enforceable fine you’d have to break a law, and it seems in the New Forest biking off legal routes is prohibited under local by-laws rather than the CRoW / Wildlife & Countryside Acts.

So OK you’d be fined, and unless you volunteered your identity, in order to fine someone you’d need their name and address (possibly DOB I forget) and only a policeman has the authority to demand this – council employees don’t have the powers to ask this of you, they may ask / intimidate, but you don’t have to say anything.

Like fatsimon mk2 said, basically you’d have to stand around, wait for a copper to turn up in the middle of nowhere (which they won’t) who at worse would ask you not to do it again as they really couldn’t be bothered to turn it into a case. And if it ever got that far you could fight it in court, ask for evidence to support the fine / it wasnt me guv / there aren’t any signs / etc. And its bad PR really.

In fairness the FC couldn’t really send a press release out and say “we cant really do anything about this” so are bluffing. I do it all the time 😛

By the look of it royal parks are policed by .. the police and / or park rangers have the powers to issue fines.

We are off to the New Forest for a family holiday this year, with bikes. this kind of story makes me very angry to the point of not wanting to visit. I love the forest, but can’t stand the people who live there.
From past visits and path signage I have the impression that not only do they not like bikes, they would rather you don’t walk in the forest either, they just want you to visit the tea shops, souvenir shops, leave your money and go home.