Wild camping dartmoor threatened again
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Try talking to some land owners, some might be receptive to opening up their land some might provide you with real examples of their concerns. If you replace a stile with a gate do you not see you will open it up to motorbikes? You'll also likely to increase dog usage and fouling.
Sorry Nigel but if you come to Berkshire you'll find all of that and more. I've seen folk drive out and take their rubbish and dump it in the paths and bridle ways. The local MP had a public go at the Police about the illegal electric motorbikes on cyclepaths and footpaths. There are a lot of off road MX motorbikes going thru the woods etc and simply do not care about restrictions etc. Sustrans claimed they were going to prevent it on one riverside path. Fitted a pole barrier - youth explained to me how easy and quick it was to slide his bike underneath and just carry on riding.
A good bushcrafter should be able to stealth camp anywhere.
What I have noticed lately here in Oz is that none of the current crop of lightweight tents are in anything other than bright and/or neon fabrics. No field grey or olive drab at all. Lots of camouflage stuff in surplus military or boy soldier stuff tho and all at the very heavy end of the market.
The high cost of legal disposal makes rubbish dumping a real problem everywhere but much worse in some places I guess. We really need better recycling and we need a combination of better policing and better made products that have a long service life and aren't "disposable"
What I have noticed lately here in Oz is that none of the current crop of lightweight tents are in anything other than bright and/or neon fabrics. No field grey or olive drab at all. Lots of camouflage stuff in surplus military or boy soldier stuff tho and all at the very heavy end of the market.
The high cost of legal disposal makes rubbish dumping a real problem everywhere but much worse in some places I guess. We really need better recycling and we need a combination of better policing and better made products that have a long service life and aren't "disposable"
Hooray!!
Wild camping will be allowed on Dartmoor after the supreme court ruled that a multimillionaire landowner was wrong to ban it on his land.
Dartmoor was – until the legal action – the only place in England where wild camping without the permission of the landowner was enshrined in law. In Scotland, people have enjoyed this right since 2003.
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news...al-supreme-court-rules?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other
Wild camping will be allowed on Dartmoor after the supreme court ruled that a multimillionaire landowner was wrong to ban it on his land.
Dartmoor was – until the legal action – the only place in England where wild camping without the permission of the landowner was enshrined in law. In Scotland, people have enjoyed this right since 2003.
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news...al-supreme-court-rules?CMP=Share_iOSApp_Other
The man knew the laws when he bought the land. Mr Arrogance, the one man enclosure act enforcer, lost and has had its come uppance, common sense reigns for once.
Hurrah!
Supreme Court backs wild camping on Dartmoor https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/cwywwq5zkqwo
I like this quote: Judges said "public regulation" of people's use of Dartmoor was "likely to be more effective in protecting the land than attempts by private persons to challenge such use through themselves having to confront people on their land and bring a claim in private law".
I like this quote: Judges said "public regulation" of people's use of Dartmoor was "likely to be more effective in protecting the land than attempts by private persons to challenge such use through themselves having to confront people on their land and bring a claim in private law".
This is what gets me, and where I get annoyed with some landowners. People buy land knowing full well there is public access, or a footpath or blah blah, then retrospectively try and revoke the access. It's just not on.
Farmer near me decided he'd grow corn over a large stretch of public footpath and put up signs saying people simply weren't allowed in the field. Thankfully people like this are in the minority, but as you said it's complete arrogance.
Report it and stomp it down!
When people complain about the existence of, or are ambivalent about rights of way I always remind them that the right of access on a ROW has the same status as a public road. Imagine the outcry from motorists if someone felled a tree across a road, or if you blocked a landowners legal access to his land or buildings.
I certainly didn't let it stop my hike. The issue was magnified by it being just a section within a much longer trail through agricultural land, so the alternative was to trespass on land which didn't have a right of way, or go several miles back and be unable to finish the route.
Fantastic news, and hopefully it will add to the momentum and pressure to extend access rights to much more of England.
I don’t mind a small diversion around a field margin to avoid trampling crops but not when it’s deliberately done to prevent access.
Can we get this right guys, wild camping per se was NOT banned on Dartmoor, or even threatened to be banned. It was a small area of the designated wild camping area owned by two private landowners that was the issue, and I for one, are over the moon they lost. As far as I am concerned, they can go back to their urban hell hole, they are not welcome here.
But it has nothing to do with the “Right to Roam” brigade, who were jumping around with their banner like a load of over excited children, nothing at all. They are two separate issues.
As someone who lives in the DNP, born and bred, started my working life on a Dartmoor farm, then worked on the moor for nearly 30 years, trek and wild camp on Dartmoor, it is literally my life. I am passionate about Dartmoor, and will fight, or do my best, to preserve it, preserve the right to wild camp within the designated areas, and to walk or hike on the access land, footpath and bridleways etc, In fact I have and do nearly daily.
I am able to give a pretty well informed opinion, certainly more than many. But “Right to Roam”……..Never! Purely ridiculous, why should anyone have the right to go WHEREVER they wish. Some may not like that, but that’s the way I feel, as a Dartmoor man, a countryman, and a very responsible hiker, wild camper and bushcrafter.
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On the other hand, why should anyone have the right to 'own' land and prevent others from accessing it? A true nutjob concept!
Especially given that the majority of the English countryside is owned by people unfit to own and manage land. Food crops sprayed with poisons toxic to humans and wildlife alike, grazing animals kept in sheds all their lives and fatted on an unnatural diet...
I'm sorry, but the majority of landowners have no moral high ground over even irresponsible leisure users.
Anyway, regardless of the above, if you study the aims of the Ramblers, and 'Right to roam' movement, they are not campaigning for a free-for-all, go wherever you wish situation- gardens, arable fields etc would remain private. There are details on their website and even a draft act here.
All based on what works very nicely in Scotland, and Scandinavia.
Total, and absolute rubbish
I would very strongly suggest that I would have forgotten more than you know about rural life, and the reality. But we are never going to agree so no point in continuing, but at what university were you brain washed?
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