Hertfordshire Lanes?????

A few comments on the following:

Booger said:

Nicely said Jai, I don't think you have offended anyone with that post

Going forward, I see your points clearly, and I'll raise a slightly different viewpoint shortly, and I'm sure a few others will raise their viewpoints too (please do - because this debate has progessed beyond petty name calling and now makes sense )

Maybe it would make sense, when we have a few different viewpoints, to vote on an official Landyzone Greenlaning Policy. That way when speaking with councils etc, we can say we are a democratic group, and we have the following official policy. Grippa put up a sticky thread to this effect.Itwas basically a link to the GLASS regs.

Obviously no such policy is enforcable, but it would be good to know what the majority of people think, and to use as a guide for what not to do, and if done by accident, what not to post about !

So here are my current personal views (which I could be talked out with logical argument)

1. We pay taxes, like Ramblers and Horse Riders. They have thousands of foot paths, rights of way, and Bridle Ways for the horses. Why should they have exclusive/any rights to the Byways, which by nature are roads, and are for cars. True.

2. a) Once you remove vegetation from the soil, it will start to erode with just wind and rain. It doesn't matter if no vehicles drive it, it will still erode.Not striclty true.

b) When a road is in such a state that a standard land rover can't get by without difficulty, no car can get by anyway, so why should we then stop using the lanes. Untill the lanes are repaired/tarred, which they would be if there were enough legitmate users, no one can use them ! So should we then stop using them so that ramblers don't get their feet muddy ? If we rag a lane with a defender then say a gyalander cant get down it, isnt that selfish?My classic grounds out before the defenders i go out with.But my classic is far from a standard road car.


3. As for managing public perceptions I think we are confusing the Ramblers perceptions with that of the general public. The vast majority of the public haven't even heard of green lanes, and if they heard what I said above, I think they would support us.Why would they support something they arent interested in or understand?

I also think that the majority of the public perceive Rambles as eccentric tosspots, because that is what I thought of them the first time I heard about them, and this was many years before I ever got a Land Rover or drove a Green Lane. Some ramblers are toss pots, Im a hiker me self. And a laner so what does that make me?Me socks in red, but i do have a hat for cold days!

So my current personal opinion is we shouldn't be scared to stand up for what is fair and resonable, and fight for it. We are never going to appease to the Ramblers, so lets not even try. Lets rather all contact our local councils who administer the lanes we love, and say,

"We are a democratic group of greenlaners that believe "insert whatever we decide" and we would like to ensure that the lanes remain open, so what can we do to make sure they say open."

Then instead of our random acts of kindness going un-noticed by the people that matter, they would know exacly what we do for the community !

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This is the reason I've not been a member of GLASS because when I wanted help in the area about some existing green lanes needing clearing and one needing lots of work nobody seemed bothered even after many phone calls and emails and I never renewed. i have had much more info and luck with Beds council than GLASS still awaiting confirmation from the main rubbish man if we can take the fly tipped rubbish to the local tidy tip that needs clearing from pepperstock and others.

with all that said the ammount of effort and time GLASS have spent we owe them my personal experience wasnt that great but they are there for the greater good for us to enjoy the lanes we love

I think the problem is this:
this is me on a lane in essex, most of you lot will probbly know it too.The lane is constantly water logged but is firm based, so in my opion driveable.But i wouldnt walk it, and i suppose noone else would.Should i have drfiven it?I cant see any damage being done, ie the lane doesnt get worse, but an outside could see this asnd say, with some justification "that shouldnt be driven"

i am with booger on this one.

as one of the most widely quoted facts within this debate, i am sure you will all have heard that less than 2% of routes are greenlanes, or something to that tune. there are countless paths and bridleways for users to rable and ride along, and enjoy. the tiny minority are greenlanes, to the extent that in some areas there are none ( i need to drive a good 30 minutes to get to my nearest greenlane)

its a game of 2 sides. if a lane were to get rutted and "unpassable" the councils frequently pave or level it. this allows fly tippers to access the area, with normal vehicles and vans. if this does not happen an it is left, vehicles will stop using it, resulting in an overgrown lane that noone or nothing can use.

tractors continue to use lanes that are muddy as access to fields, shortcuts, etc. this inevitably causes significant damage to lanes. however they continue to use them whatever the state and no flak is recieved on their part to the best of their knowledge as they are doing their job. so how then can so much flak be taken by a group such as ourselves who do no and at the very worst minimal damage to a lane? if a lane is hugely churned up by agricultural use it will not magically get better because we have decided not to go down it - it wont change the farmer from driving down there afterall.

furthermore people seem to forget that "this lot" of landy owners actually help out whenever and wherever reasonable.

i will first point to the photos of gibbo-phil and jai rescuing a fire engine in the snow.

likewise a recent lane clearing trip in surrey resulted in countless bits of rubbish, tyres etc being picked up, making the route more pleasant for all that use it.

on the way back from bournemouth on wednesday i towed car where a woman and her 2 young kids were stranded on the slow lane of a duel carriageway with no hard shoulder - shortly before a lorry swerved right into the position she had been moments previously. she called me up 3 nights ago and thanked me on behalf of their whole family as the believed she may have been hit by the lorry had i not moved her to safety.

this weekend, spending an hour of our laning time closing off a road for the police in a multi fatality accident, whilst they dealt with the incident.

people are quick to demonise, and it seems actually we are quite slow to stick up for each other. i enjoy greenlaning, i do not go out to trash them. i help out with whatever i can whenever i can. if a rambler breaks his leg and needs help i will stop and assist.

to be totally honest because of the vehicles we choose to drive we are an asset to councils and the local community for many reasons, i think this is the side of us the public see. the people of essex that saw the "off roaders" closing off the road, and having the situation explained and being redirected by booger, redwings and b3aker. even having cyclists stop by and us getting out our maps and plotting a new route for him, or directing other cars around the incident as there was no diversion

perhaps we need to stop cowering at the fact that one association of people are so dead set against what we do, many others are endlessly thankful of what we contribute.

goonarmy - the public would support us for exactly the reason i have just stated, i truly believe alot of people value our contribution, and incidents like sundays road closure only go further to reinforce that public image

carpy said:

goonarmy - the public would support us for exactly the reason i have just stated, i truly believe alot of people value our contribution, and incidents like sundays road closure only go further to reinforce that public image

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I would agree with that if we were a 4x4 response group.Whilst you helped at an incident, i have done the same in me works van.Doesnt mean the public image of my construction company has changed though. Id be honestly surpised if the general conception of us isnt "The offroaders" from the fast show or worse.

im a bit late posting this i think Carpy has pretty mush said it already:
Glass have spent along time putting together their guidelines.
The problem comes like this:
The council have a duty to maintain all unsurfaced byways for ALL to use as and when they wish to. This leaves them with 2 options, remove the vehicular rights, which is quite costly to a council or resurface the lane so that everyone can drive it and the ongoing maintainance cost is cheaper. This has been done all over the place in Hertfordshire. But this then brings more problems like that of pepperstock where they are seriously considering A permanant TRO but only after some vehicle width limiting measures due to fly tipping. Either way im sure none of us like the outcome but its the only way to keep these RoW open for use. my fear is by us not being as careful as we could be we are acclerating the ammount of closures and therefore the resurfacing of many of our beautiful RoW. Its not about us beong good people, anyone on here im sure would help an emergancy service in need weather it be in snow, time of crysis or any other. The fact that we own 4x4's isnt a major consideration to the public I would like to think that everyone would stop to help somone in trouble but these days its not so the norm. Well done Carpy and others for putting yourselves out to help others. Its very co,endable indeed.

Another thing that i would like to point out - Certian people in the Council and very anti-greenlaning.

I know of a number of lanes round here that have TRO's on them for no reason what so ever, which to my knowlage we have no way of protesting against once they are in place, or asking for a review of it.

There are very few people out there to help us, unlike the Ramblers that would like to see it banned who every baised idiot on the council would like to help.

comendable

goonarmy said:

I would agree with that if we were a 4x4 response group.Whilst you helped at an incident, i have done the same in me works van.Doesnt mean the public image of my construction company has changed though. Id be honestly surpised if the general conception of us isnt "The offroaders" from the fast show or worse.

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and yet many other vehicles did not do it - in fact noone else who arrived near the time of the incident did, they just turned around. perhaps you are differant, but many others were not. the one copper said at the time he had nothnig but "good dealings" with "land rover owners such as yourselves" - which speaks volumes

i use my truck as a main vehicle right now. as a result i do everything from laning and off roading to driving to the supermarket, driving it longer distances to seeing friends and taking it places to walk the dogs. everywhere i go i get smiles, kids wanting photos inside and out, questions - general interest - of the positive sort

i think perhaps we like to feel like public enemy number one - reality is we are actually a valued part of many loca communities

jai_landrover said:

im a bit late posting this i think Carpy has pretty mush said it already:
Glass have spent along time putting together their guidelines.
The problem comes like this:
The council have a duty to maintain all unsurfaced byways for ALL to use as and when they wish to. This leaves them with 2 options, remove the vehicular rights, which is quite costly to a council or resurface the lane so that everyone can drive it and the ongoing maintainance cost is cheaper. This has been done all over the place in Hertfordshire. But this then brings more problems like that of pepperstock where they are seriously considering A permanant TRO but only after some vehicle width limiting measures due to fly tipping. Either way im sure none of us like the outcome but its the only way to keep these RoW open for use. my fear is by us not being as careful as we could be we are acclerating the ammount of closures and therefore the resurfacing of many of our beautiful RoW. Its not about us beong good people, anyone on here im sure would help an emergancy service in need weather it be in snow, time of crysis or any other. The fact that we own 4x4's isnt a major consideration to the public I would like to think that everyone would stop to help somone in trouble but these days its not so the norm. Well done Carpy and others for putting yourselves out to help others. Its very co,endable indeed.

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After revisiting the GLASS site I agree, I think we should just get more involved there, rather than constantly debating stuff. They have a good (in my opinion) policy, they understand soil erosion (sorry for the veiled dig goonarmy, but I grew up in Africa and have seen wind and water erosion that Spyderman {our Spyderman not the superhero} couldn't traverse check out Soil Erosion Site if you don't believe me), and nowhere on the GLASS page does it say don't drive a muddy lane !

Jai I know you had a bad experience trying to help them, but maybe you just got someone on a bad day, maybe we should make a group offer to help. I'll do it if everyone wants, but if they are rude or unhelpful God help them

Carpy if that copper sends you a thank you letter, send a copy on to GLASS.

carpy said:

i think perhaps we like to feel like public enemy number one - reality is we are actually a valued part of many loca communities

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Id be surprised.The problem is people make assmuptions, based on fact or otherwise.
The general concensus on here is that "rammblers" have red socks n moan alot.I go hiking and moan how unfit i am, not about acces rights.Assumptions will be made, however they are arrived at they might not be favorable. What springs to mind when someone says trainspotter?

Booger said:

They have a good (in my opinion) policy, they understand soil erosion (sorry for the veiled dig goonarmy, but I grew up in Africa and have seen wind and water erosion that Spyderman {our Spyderman not the superhero} couldn't traverse check out Soil Erosion Site if you don't believe me), and nowhere on the GLASS page does it say don't drive a muddy lane !

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I know full well about erosion, im a geologist. Im not trying to take anything away from anyone, well done to all who help others whilst in their landys, but that wont keep lanes open or alter public opinion.

lol I am happy to give GLASS another go now the Beds guy is actually a counciler on the Rights of way bit i think but cannot say 100% but he is a good chap by all accounts. I just believe green laning should be free

One big problem is that simply _anyone_ can legally drive a lane.

Now in my opinion this is a good thing and right and proper. The horrible truth is, however, that many driveable lanes are misused, wheel-spinning etc by nobheads or used for fly-tipping or for criminal purposes, burnt-out stolen cars for instance. We have about 9 lanes around Doncaster, three are blocked at one end by railings, so if you drive in you have to reverse out, making the definition 'Byway' a mockery .. and the rest are constantly getting fly-tipped, cleared, fly-tipped etc. Two of the lanes, being near a village, are rutted and made almost undriveable in 'normal' vehicles by the actions of the local yobs and nutters, not just in 4x4's but on motorbikes as well, and unlicensed 'scramblers', trials 4x4's etc that shouldn't be there at all. It has to be said too that some farmers also think that access to Byways is for them alone, and they often dump soilheaps, concrete, tree-trunks across lanes that shouls be accessible.

I don't know the answer, I don't think anyone does, but I think we need to continue to use the lanes in a sensible manner, and continue to develop good relations with the local council workers, police , landowners and farmers who we deal with when finding out or driving rights of way etc.

Forming more clubs or societys will only mean any efforts we put forward will be diluted and may polarise thinking such that, for instance, "Only Landrover owners are right, everyone else is wrong!" .. when plainly there are many makes and styles of green-lane suitable vehicles. The main point, though, is that no matter what people think of GLASS and TRF and other groups they are already recognised by council and government organisations and any new groups would have to do a lot of thankless, weary and downright tedious leg-work trying to get their views even heard, let alone represented properly where it matters. In our area we have precious little support from larger groups simply 'cos there aren't many lanes and thus not many green-lane drivers .. the lanes are mostly only farmers tracks anyway .. so I do my little bit on my own or with a mate, keeping those near me driveable and un-blocked as far as we can, but involving the council where necessary, to some minor success!

I think this is the way forward, check out the already existing groups and if they're reasonably represented locally to you then help, encourage, maybe even join them and add to their good works already being done. If coverage in a particular area is sparse then do a bit yourselves, but contact, say, GLASS and maybe become a local rep. They do have some experience and can lobby more effectively than any 'joebloggs4x4group' for legislation and objecting to TRO's et al. It's no good moaning about something (NOT pointing any fingers here at anyone) unless you're prepared to put some effort in to to make it something that you can't moan at.

Typical dialogue (a friend of mine) "Glass is crap, they do nowt"
"So what have you done that might help?"
Well, nothing, they're a big group with the resources, they should do it"

How can the big groups do anything if they 1. don't know what the problem is. 2. Have no local representative or anyone prepared to put some local effort in. 3. No-one new joins them. ???

Just my tuppence-worth ...

I'll join a Landyzone 'eco-group' whatever you want to call it, but I'll also still do my own thing locally .. and offer help elsewhere if necessary ...

well said,
I will continue to help doing clearances when I can if the council will take it off my hands. I do think GLASS has alot of weight behind it and its all for the good of the greenlanes as do the Trail Riders Fellowship. I may well even rejoin mabe.
Now we are getting somewhere sorry it took my huge explosive rant to get this far but we need to preserve what little RoW we have left for us to keep using by being on the ball. Since I have owned my 90 about half the leagal Row in the area have dissapeared i reckon, (The reclassfication) its frustating loosing such great lanes I once drove down on a sunny summers evening with the roof off.

while we are on this groundbreaking stuff has anyone thought about compiling a list of landyzone members phone numbers and location for people to use if help is needed. i am certainly up for helping out people locally if help is required.

My number has changed so I will PM those who had the old one. If anyone else wants it PM me.

I think it had been done cos I passed my number onn to somone a while ago. A landyzone member I never heared from adam, phoned me a while back to say he was stuck in a quarry, I then told him to try Glenn cos he got off work early but couldn't get him out too boggy, a few hours past and and a unimog and broken shackel later he was still stuck, but a few of us turned up and got him out in the we leave nobody behind saying that the guys mate who was also stuck nicked my shackel cheeky bastid, This was on a private quarry site.