Save stought DH

[cozzy]

Forestry commission doing what the forestry do. Shutting down trails.

Signez la pétition

Save Stoughton DH

chng.it

 

[The Hodge]

What's the reason for the closure ?
If its to harvest the timber then there will be very little you can do about it ..as upsetting as that might be .

 

[cozzy]

I have no more details than is on their Facebook page.

To all my friends can you please help me save the mountain bike track that I've been digging for over 20 years up at Stoughton.
If you could sign and share this petition to as many of your friends as possible to help me I would be eternally grateful.
All the work that has gone into digging the site for the mountain biking community to use could all be gone in the next few weeks if the forestry commission have their way, and we are hopping to show the forestry commission some good numbers to help save the site for future use by everyone..

 

[The Hodge]

There is not too much info on there in terms of why ..but rather than send that in blind I would be finding out who their recreation & tourism officer is and try to have a conversation with him first ..it just might be that if it is due to harvesting then it could be done sympathetically and the trails could be saved ..this has certainly happened in the area where I live .
Without trying to sound too arsey The Forestry Commission no longer exist ..its now Forestry England
Good luck ..

 

[Spangoolies]

Signed and shared. This is probably my favourite local spot, nice and chilled place to ride and great for building confidence. I hope this can be stopped, one jump away from completing the black run, took me 4 years to pluck the courage to hit the big drop, need another 4 years at least

 

[dobbyhasfriends]

we've lost loads of trails here due to felling, if thats it you've no chance, if its a working then thats their business.

 

[cozzy]

Latest information ive found.
So not tree disease or harvesting which of course would be an acceptable reason to close trails. Just the forestry being dicks.

forestry has a new head honcho and he has been up there and is fuming with the jumps and what’s been done and believes we’ve had machinery in there to build the jumps so has ordered machinery to go in and flatten it all. This could be happening in the next week according to our source within the forestry.
We’ve been trying to get meeting with them them for over a month and have been ignored, and they’ve had meeting’s up there without telling us…….. sneaky, sly, and dishonest…….

 

[irie]

One of our favourite spots, only 15 minutes from us.

 

[Spangoolies]

This sucks. We lost Headdown at QE recently too

 

[The Hodge]

Looks like you have an uphill struggle to keep it ...the one thing that Forestry England are shit hot on is Health & Safety..( we had the same sermon every time we did some " official" trail building as volunteers .. ) still worth trying to get in touch with this head honcho to see if something can be done ..

 

[cozzy]

Looks like you have an uphill struggle to keep it ...the one thing that Forestry England are shit hot on is Health & Safety..( we had the same sermon every time we did some " official" trail building as volunteers .. ) still worth trying to get in touch with this head honcho to see if something can be done ..

Yes the main man who has been looking after stoughton for 20 years is on it.

 

[cozzy]

This sucks. We lost Headdown at QE recently too

True. Headdown comes & goes though over the years. Gets super busy. Gets flattened. Gets build up again. Rinse & repeat.
Hoping the quarryside qecp stuff is still there. That was always fun.

Im just super pissed as I take early retirement in 7 days. The main reason was to get more riding in before I become too decrepit.
With the recent loss of aston hill (which I dont believe is ever coming back despite what they say), revolution & cmwcarn uplifts, its all a bit depressing.

 

[dobbyhasfriends]

Im just super pissed as I take early retirement in 7 days. The main reason was to get more riding in before I become too decrepit.

take up daydrinking, problems solved !

a little more seriously, we have illegal trails here and NRW have put signs up saying that they shouldnt be ridden etc.. now while they are the same status as any other illegal trails there are very few man made features like jumps and drops etc so as a result there is less to 'flatten', ill be interested to see what happens in the future.
as a matter of interest, NRW actually messaged me on facebook regarding one of my videos from those trails, urging me not to make illegal trails. I did message them back saying I was riding what I found and wasnt building anything. This only goes to show that they are using anything you put out there, pics, vids, strava etc to find these places and shut them down so be careful what you post.

 

[cozzy]

take up daydrinking, problems solved !

a little more seriously, we have illegal trails here and NRW have put signs up saying that they shouldnt be ridden etc.. now while they are the same status as any other illegal trails there are very few man made features like jumps and drops etc so as a result there is less to 'flatten', ill be interested to see what happens in the future.
as a matter of interest, NRW actually messaged me on facebook regarding one of my videos from those trails, urging me not to make illegal trails. I did message them back saying I was riding what I found and wasnt building anything. This only goes to show that they are using anything you put out there, pics, vids, strava etc to find these places and shut them down so be careful what you post.

Strava is a bloody scourge in mtb as are a lot of youtube 'influencers'.
Looking forward to relocating to Wales in a few years. Would be nice to have the good stuff nearby rather than 2+ hours away.

 

[dobbyhasfriends]

Strava is a bloody scourge in mtb as are a lot of youtube 'influencers'.
Looking forward to relocating to Wales in a few years. Would be nice to have the good stuff nearby rather than 2+ hours away.

yep, I have whatever I want on the doorstep here apart from Dyfi which is 2 hours away..

 

[Humanbeersponge]

There were similar issues near me in Guisboro woods, FC didnt mind trails that much but as soon as people started making gap jumps and using old timber to pack out the earth they came down and took them out.

 

[Mikerb]

this is a difficult problem. On one hand the Forest England forests provide fantastic mtb riding...and its free! I especially like riding in forest because it is natural trial....albeit enhanced in places!! For me it beat hands down bike park manicured trails. Looking at it from Forestry England's point of view however, the forest is a business and whilst the vast majority of those forests allow or even encourage public access Forestry England then has a health and safety responsibility..at least to a degree.......given the mix of users can be walkers, dog walkers, and mountain/gravel bikes.
The middle road as far as I can see is the "Trail Centre". These are closer to natural trails but are maintained and graded....and car parking is not free. I quite often go to Halden Forest ( nr Exeter) which invariably busy any day of the week. The trail centre has a bike shop, bike hire, cafe, childrens play area, extensive car parking and a mix of green, blue, red and one black trail.
So I wonder if Forestry England in those forests mtb trails mentioned here under threat of H and S shut down, could be salvaged by some form of agreement with Forestry England? If they were responsible for the trail build and maintenance..and grading..... perhaps in return for an annual subscription........that may provide an avenue to satisfy their H and S concerns and cover their costs.
I have local forests which could easilly fall foul of the same as those being posted here.