Cycling UK Forum

Hi,

MDC wrote:The thing about dog walkers is that they actually need to be present to be a nuisance whereas horse riders can churn up a path and leave it unrideable.

And when it dries try walking on the mesh of holes and ridges, just like walking on a field where cattle have been.
Its the peoples attitude not the actual passtime, but in my neck of the woods ( and the country all over ) horses mean money and with it goes the offspring who might have been born here but are eduacated to think they are the cream.
A gripe and corruption of the BBC is to only patronise children who talk like that " Toffee nose"
My first complaint to the BBC was that all children were reading from a board when interviewed, they halted that same day and it has never returned.
Now its only showing children from upper class Especially the South West where we are all farmer types, even the outsiders are londoners or lancs etc
Devon people dont talk that way, even the parents of the children dont talk like that.
Note every time children appear on tv in news programs, how local they sound.....not

Dogs well a daily nuisance to me a dog owner too.
And we know that they can bring you down and break bones too.

MDC wrote:The thing about dog walkers is that they actually need to be present to be a nuisance whereas horse riders can churn up a path and leave it unrideable.

Problem is that the same argument can be used by walkers about cyclists. Like us, horse riders are limited to a very small part of the RoW network, and the selection as to which they can use seem totally arbitrary with no thought to how well suited the track is.

Si wrote:

MDC wrote:The thing about dog walkers is that they actually need to be present to be a nuisance whereas horse riders can churn up a path and leave it unrideable.

Problem is that the same argument can be used by walkers about cyclists. Like us, horse riders are limited to a very small part of the RoW network, and the selection as to which they can use seem totally arbitrary with no thought to how well suited the track is.

Perhaps it appears arbitrary but of course most are thus because it's a RoW established over hundreds of years.

Not really. The arbitrariness was down to the whims of local councillors and landowners when they classified. And, of course, whether or not they crossed parish boundaries. There was no decisive guidance and trails were not classified based upon fitness for use.

I am an occasional dog walker and more frequently a bike rider along the many railway lines converted to cycle/footpaths around here.I find most dog walkers very considerate of bike riders.However,I find some,,,not all I might add,but some bikers very ignorant.Some want to pedal past as fast as possible,no bell,no shout,no nothing,scares the life out of me at times and must un-nerve animals.it takes nothing for bikers to be polite,,,god forbid slow down a little when passing people,,

Whilst everyone sees things solely from their own point of view there will always be friction.

durhambiker wrote:I am an occasional dog walker and more frequently a bike rider along the many railway lines converted to cycle/footpaths around here.I find most dog walkers very considerate of bike riders.However,I find some,,,not all I might add,but some bikers very ignorant.Some want to pedal past as fast as possible,no bell,no shout,no nothing,scares the life out of me at times and must un-nerve animals.it takes nothing for bikers to be polite,,,god forbid slow down a little when passing people,,

For this reason I no longer go to the two best places to walk my dogs, too many unpleasant moments with cyclists. It's sad as I am also uncomfortable cycling there now too for the very same reasons of unpleasant cyclists.

Dogs - waste of space, don't even taste nice. Whereas my Horseburgers I unwittingly ate last year were fine.

MDC wrote:Who gets your vote for the most irritating?

Neither.
It's other cyclists I find the most irritating.

I have nearly fallen off my bike at Llandegla due to people thinking it's ok to have their dog off the lead on a bike specific trail with them. Dogs on these sort of trails could cause a serious accident. These dog owners are stupid!!!!!!

When I ride off road, my dog usually comes along with me. She's better behaved than many of the other mountain bikers I come across. As for horses, our local stretch of the Sustrans route is absolutely covered in horse ****.

Dirk wrote:When I ride off road, my dog usually comes along with me. She's better behaved than many of the other mountain bikers I come across. As for horses, our local stretch of the Sustrans route is absolutely covered in horse ****.

The thing is you have no idea when approaching the dog if it's well behaved or some idiot dog who's going to run in front of you. The owners often get upset with your caution too being like "he's ok!!" Of course I've had situations where the owners have shouted that their dog is well behaved and then it's ran in front of me

And yeah a few times a particularly narrow bit of path and a horse crap pile about a foot high and difficult to avoid. Nasty

Neither. The animals don't bother me half as much as people that have no respect for others. As regards accidents that i've been witness to on shared paths; one fractured wrist with serious dental injury in a cyclist was caused by another cyclist, and one dislocated shoulder in a cyclist caused by an out of control dog.

I've had to eat my words..... out for a spin today in between the showers, and had to physically stop three times on the local shared use path because of dogs running wild across the track in front of me; the owners really didn't give a damn, not one of them made the slightest attempt to control their dog!
AND was chased by the same dog twice, once on the ride out and then on the way home.
For the record, Sally my Collie didn't go with me today, she went for a run with my daughter instead...

MDC wrote:The thing about dog walkers is that they actually need to be present to be a nuisance whereas horse riders can churn up a path and leave it unrideable.

If you are talking about bridleways there isn't any obligation to make it rideable so you can't complain about. Also cyclists must give way to other users. In general I don't have problems with other users at all. I think the main problem lies with some of the mountain bikers and aggressive riding.