sirmy wrote:Bicycler the definition of a footway in the 1970 is irrelevaent as the Disabled and Chronically Sick Act specifies that the defintion of a footway to be used in conjunction with the act is the one given in the 1980 Highways Act via an ammendment to the act. So while the defintion of a footway may be broader in the 1970 act it would be a mistake to interpret the act in terms of this definition. The intention of this clause was not allow access to all paths accessible on foot to people in invalid carriages but to remove obstacles to the passage of invalid carriages along footways (which would have been illegal under the 1835 HA), next to carriagewas, on streets. To try to extend the term "footway" to include all paths accessible on foot is wrong. Your use of the term carriageway is also incorrect as to include a footway as part of the carriageway would mean it was legal to drive a vehicle along a footway which it isn't (1835 highways act sec 72) which prohibits a “carriage of any description” being used on a footway - hence this part of the 1970 act. They are not both parts of "a vehicular road" but are seperate entities running adjacent or paralelll to each other with very different access rights - you can drive a vehicle on a carriageway you cannot drive (except in certain specific instances) a vehicle on a footway (http://www.roadswerenotbuiltforcars.com/1835highwayact/).
The upshot of this is that the 1970 act only applies to footways (paths alongside roads) and not to the types of paths identified in the original and subsequent postings and would not be applicable in an application to remove these barriers
@Sirmy
Firstly I very much appreciate your challenges here - which help with all our thinking. As iron strikes iron, so one sharpens another etc. Also, for everyone else who has posted.
Having said that , and after looking up the Acts of Parliament etc on this one, I'm with bicycler on the interpretation here.
The statement in the Chronically Sick and Disabled Persons Act 1970 as amended by the 1980 Highways Act is:
“footway” means a way which is a footway, footpath or bridleway within the meaning of the Highways Act 1980
That surely means that the rights of access granted by this Act apply to all three categories of "footway" AND "footpath" AND "bridleway" as defined individually within the 1980 Act, which definitions are quoted a few messages ago.
Also, this Act is cited in the Statutory Guidance on Rights of Way Improvement Plans issued in 2002 in the context of Access to Rights of Way in the countryside beyond those alongside highways.
http://disabledramblers.co.uk/wp3/wp-co ... -rowip.pdf
Also in Section 60 of that Act seems to me to make the assumption of Access Rights to "local rights of way" for people who have impaired mobility, which includes Bridleways and Footpaths.
http://www.legislation.gov.uk/ukpga/200 ... ment-plans
This is one tool amongst several to skin the various access cats, and I think we may have taken this particular aspect of the conversation as far as we can.
Ferdinand