Appeal from TRF

[floyd fan]

The TRF victory over the PDNPA and the Chapel Gate ETRO could be short-lived because the Authority has a meeting arranged for the 25th January at the PDNP Head Office to close it again.

I know its a Friday but its vitally important we make a lasting impression on the attendees to that meeting that they are messing with the wrong People. whilst we have speakers inside the meeting from the various user groups the Authority is just not listening to us and ignoring our rights.

We require as many Trailbikers and 4 x 4 vehicles as possible in the carpark at Alderny House BEFORE 9.00am to prevent visitors and members parking easily. We will conduct a Rally and Protest at the highest possible volume, complete with Placards, Banners, loud hailers and advertising. (Peak District National Park Authority, Aldern House, Baslow Road, Bakewell, Derbyshire, DE45 1AE)

This will only work if we are in the Hundreds. ( thousands would be good) we have to demonstrate to the Authorities that what they are doing by banning us from the Green Lanes affects a great number of people from allover the country. i implore every TRF Group, every motorcycle and 4 x 4 club to be represented and bring your vehicles ( road legal of course) and bring your Club Flags/ banners for identification as we will be on the Telly and all the papers.

After the Rally we will go out onto the lanes for a mass ride out, maybe more so be prepared.

The purpose of this is to persuade the Authority that it will be easier to work with us than Ban us. We want them to stop wasting the publics money and sit down and talk with us...........I want to be able to threaten the PDNPA that if they don't listen to us i have the power to cause them so much disruption they will regret the day they started this course of action and i can only do it if i have numbers. I can only do it if YOU care enough to take a day off work to be there on the 25Th of January.

Tell your friends, tell the Ramblers, tell everyone we are coming to Bakewell on the 25th........more the merrier. Please post this on your forums.

Cheers ... FF ...

[ejparrott]

The only thing I would say is that with the weather conditions a mass ride out on the lanes might not be the best idea, unless they are all rock based. If the lanes get damaged by the sheer number of vehicles, it will play right in to the oppositions hands.

[David Sparkes]

The only thing I would say is that with the weather conditions a mass ride out on the lanes might not be the best idea, unless they are all rock based. If the lanes get damaged by the sheer number of vehicles, it will play right in to the oppositions hands.

Please rearrange your priorities.

The important thing is to turn up at Aldred House and spend a couple of hours there. No-one is expecting you to speak to the meeting.

Any organised 'ride-out' is optional.

We do need people to support the event, not look for excuses in the fine detail as to why they can't make it that day.

Regards.

[martifers]

Will try and make it though i completely agree with EJ about the mass ride out in these conditions.

[simonr]

While in no way do I condone behaving irresponsibly or driving lanes that are in an unsuitable condition, what seems to have become the LAW for greenlaning "Thou shalt take no more than five vehicles through a lane so as not to inconvenience or upset other users" does not seem to have had the desired effect!

People are no so reluctant to use the lanes that they are easy to justify closing as the benefit to other users outweighs the inconvenience to the few existing users! Courteous Green laning seems to have become almost invisible - and the other users only see the ones who misbehave as they are now the majority. This again makes them easier to close. At least if more people drove the lanes visibly, the bad element would be diluted and the perception of other users would not be wholly negative.

Si

[ejparrott]

Please rearrange your priorities.

The important thing is to turn up at Aldred House and spend a couple of hours there. No-one is expecting you to speak to the meeting.

Any organised 'ride-out' is optional.

We do need people to support the event, not look for excuses in the fine detail as to why they can't make it that day.

Regards.

Oh I wasn't disagreeing with as many people turning out as possible, we certainly need to show a massive amount of support to keep the lanes open.

However, if you then have 50 motors going out and driving lanes that are not rock based, with the weather we've been having they will be destroyed by the end of the day and the anti's will then turn round and say 'see, look at the damage, told you'! We went out new years day around Clun. A group of bikes and Land Rover/4x4 owners have been up one of the lanes with Insa Turbo special tracks, and have completely destroyed one lane in the 6 weeks since I last went. Treadlightly also posted on Facebook at the weekend to say that over 80 vehicles had been counted on salisbury plain in a few hours, dispite the weather, and the lanes were completly trashed.

[mudmagnet]

The comment about 80 vehicles on the plain at christmas should be taken in context with the size of the plain which covers about the size of the isle of Wight

[ejparrott]

80 vehicles, in a few hours, and that was before dinner. The lanes were reported as 'trashed' then. I am aware of the size of the plain. It wasn't just 'at Christmas', this was in one morning alone.

[Retroanaconda]

The 80 vehicles claim was I believe feferring to the mud hole by Copehill Down FIBUA village.

From the wardens photos I saw it all looked pretty normal for the plain, it's always a mud bath out there!

[sean f]

I will leave the ride out as another subject but attending a meeting like this on mass is just about the only way to achieve a result.

I am cynical enough to believe the decision is likely to have been already taken, the meeting is likely to be just to tick the box and say they have doen it correctly but there is no reason to make it easy for them and it might just make them think more next time.

Unfortunately as with most politics what is correct or right is totally beside the point. The people who get there way are the ones that shout and scream a lot and manage to get the press backing them with distorted or even down right false claims, the fact they are a minority and / or baseing a decision on incorrect information or the belief the decision will have effects it clearly won't doesn't matter. They will still claim they were right all along even if time proves they were wrong.

In this case many of the backers for a closure will believe that closing a lane will stop 4x4's and bikes from racing up and down an area ripping up ground all over the place and causing people to dive out of the way, it won't the people who do that are breaking the law already and will continue to do so, the people who will be effected will be the silent unnoticed ones who drive or ride in a legal way on legal routes and now won't be able to as they are unwilling to break the law.

Perhaps I am being overly cynical but I lost my last sport when legislation was past even though the goverments own public enquiry recommended against doing so, my property was confiscated for which I am STILL awaiting the promised compensation and all the law has done is effect the law abiding those who previously broke the law have continued to do so and the "problem" it was supposed to fix is now even worst than it was at the time.

[ejparrott]

I believe you are quite correct that the decision has already been taking. You are very right to say those who make the most noise get their way..that's why the redsocks are getting the lanes closed to vehicles....