Cycling UK Forum

We used to have a massive problem with this at Rother Valley Country Park. I actually saw a bloke unloading a lorry load of scramblers at the entrance once so it wasn't just the kids who thought it was perfectly fine. The police had a crackdown and the problem hasn't resurfaced. 'course, some idiot decided to have noisy motor boats on one of the lakes so it's still too noisy there for my tastes.

LANDSURFER74 wrote:Possibly we are being a little to obsessive about motor bikes ...possibly the number of unlicenced, uninsured who want to ride on canal banks is fairly low... maybe the solution is worse than the problem ??????

Exactly!

alicej wrote:Is there any other potential solution we should be campaigning for? How about if temporary barriers were put up - promptly - in places where there's a current persistent problem with motorbikes, then automatically removed six months later to see if the problem comes back or not?

Which makes planning a ride using Sustrans even more of a lottery than it is now. Unless you ride a solo with no baggage and narrow bars, but with wide tyres you cannot know if a route that was clelar and free last week has a temporary barrier blocking your way.

Sadly Sustrans is a great idea so variably implemented that it is not fit for purpose. What a shame!

karlt wrote:We used to have a massive problem with this at Rother Valley Country Park. I actually saw a bloke unloading a lorry load of scramblers at the entrance once so it wasn't just the kids who thought it was perfectly fine. The police had a crackdown and the problem hasn't resurfaced. 'course, some idiot decided to have noisy motor boats on one of the lakes so it's still too noisy there for my tastes.

The TPT hasn't been too bad since the local plod and the ranger service put their heads together. There are warning signs all around Killamarsh Station area that nuisance bikes can be seized. Some of the retired miners from Renishaw wouldn't think twice about shoving a tree branch into the front wheel either!

However the number of 'anti motorbike' ...and bicycle traps between Stavley and Poolsbrook Park is ridculous, you can't peddle more than 100 mtrs without getting off your bike ...

I haven't been that way for 9 months or so, but from the Fire Station (by the Road To Nowhere) heading for Arkwright was trap free, the only frame was at the Poolsbrook exit.
(I used to use the Fire Station-Elm Tree Inn - Morrisons Car Park to get from the canal to the TPT when the path was a bog hole).

A cycle track which cannot be ridden is not a cycle path!

byegad wrote:A cycle track which cannot be ridden is not a cycle path!

It can be ridden - in short sections...

I'm currently talking to a lady whose daughter needs a trike (at least that's as far as they've got yet) so I intend to go on a ride and take some shots of the various barriers on one (very nice) stretch of off road cycle path. Send them off with DDA mentions and see if I get a response.

Does anyone know if this would be likely to be covered by anti-discrimination legistlation, on grounds that wheelchair users and people who needed to use a trike because of balance issues etc are excluded from using the path? If one person took a case and won then wouldn't that go a long way towards getting all barriers across the country removed?

As a rider of large wheeled upright trikes of conventional width, i.e. go through a house door, I have no problem with barriers that are like a capital A with the top and horizontal missing. They are wide enough at the lower end and just wide enough at shoulder height, hence at motorcycle handlebar height they are too narrow for most. Unfortunately the only place I've seen any is in Berkshire/Buckinghamshire. I don't have much experience of other barriers because I don't use that sort of path.

If the barriers actually did prevent disabled people getting access to an area or path, I dont see how they could fail to be illegal.

Surprisingly though, most of these barriers can be got through with a pushchair or in my case a child trailer.

I'm thinking of these on the Greenway through the London Borough of Newham http://www.google.co.uk/imgres?q=greenw ... 4&hovw=192

I have to remove both panniers (even if they're empty) while shuffling the bike around to get the pedals through, and I don't know what you're supposed to do in a wheelchair. You could easily get on at an entrance where one of these has the big side gate open, go all the way to the next gate, and find it shut so you have to turn around and go back the way you came.

meic wrote:If the barriers actually did prevent disabled people getting access to an area or path, I dont see how they could fail to be illegal.

Surprisingly though, most of these barriers can be got through with a pushchair or in my case a child trailer.

There are some barriers in Essex that I cannot get my child trailer through.

A-frame type barriers are generally passable by wheelchairs, but many invalid carriages which are adapted cycles cannot pass them. Many mobility scooters also cannot pass them, nor can some double wide (or wider) buggies. I suspect, however, that in the face of a serious legal challenge, the government and local authorities could be required to remove such barriers.

Karl T said in the OP:
'Little message for Sustrans and local authorities...
by karlt » Tue Dec 06, 2011 9:27 pm
...you know those irritating barriers that you put on cycle routes so that motorcyclists can't use them?
They're following some bikers on Police Interceptors on the box as I speak. They can get through those barriers more easily than we legitimate users can. Please don't bother.'

Have contacted Sustrans and your Local Authority about this, if so can you tell us what sort of response you had please?

Gary

Heh.

Actual responses form Sustrans or local authority:

"The police requested the barriers in that location, so we can't take them down."

"Sometimes barriers are necessary to slow cyclists down."

"They have been placed for safety. We wouldn't want children to ride out without stopping."