One of the rare clips showing the reality of 4x4s in the Peak - actually filmed by a local farmer rather than the BBC.
What an utterly bland, wishy washy piece of television last night's BBC4 Tales from the National Parks documentary on 4x4s in the Peak District was. How on earth can a BBC team film for a year and yet still manage to completely avoid the central issue of the programme?
It beats me. It really does. And it was such a shame after the excellent, thought-provoking opener about the Honister Zip-wire project in the Lakes. The central issue, if you weren't aware of it, isn't that nice little old ladies in quaint Peak District villages don't like the noise that 4x4s make or think that trail riders look and sound like Darth Vader, it is that motorised vehicular recreation and its associated destruction of tracks and paths in the Peak is utterly at odds with everyone else's right to quiet enjoyment of the outdoors.
Yes, they have a legal right - mostly - to be there, but it's a damning indictment of the absurdities of our anachronistis rights of way system that this is the case. The 'roads' which 4x4s destroy just through their use, are really nothing of the sort. They were never designed for use by motorised vehicles and by and large are completely unsuitable for 4x4s and motorcycles. Full stop.
That's the nub of it. And it's an issue the BBC team utterly shirked besides a few brief glimpses. Instead we were treated to every cliche they could drag out of their bucket of well-worn, easily comprehensible stereotypes; NIMBY cottage dwellers, eccentric old ramblers versus those nice chaps who drive around terribly politely in their 4x4s.
The reality, BBC, is nothing like that. The reality is hooligan trail bikers screaming down trails with precious little regard for the safety of others, spraying rocks and gravel into people's faces as they pass and carving new ruts into virgin hillsides. The reality is 4x4s winching their way up eroded tracks like the Roych and Rushup Edge with their wheels causing more damage in minutes than a decade's worth of walkers and mountain bikers.
The reality is people who are out in the outdoors because they like the thrill of controlling a vehicle in difficult terrain. Not because they feel any kinship with the outdoors or other outdoor users, instead they hide inside their 4x4s and their full-face helmet so in reality they're as far away from the wilderness as they can be.
How could the BBC not even touch on most of this? How could they never even mention how motorised vehicles impact on other people as well as their environment?
Meanwhile, back in BBC land, the Peak Park folk came across as squirming, fence sitters, utterly hamstrung by their legal duty to allow people to damage the environment they're supposed to be protecting. And they didn't even look embarassed to be doing it, just exasperated that the NIMBY villagers didn't understand.
Somewhere in the middle of all the cliched, sombre mood music and the stereotypes, there was a vibrant, kicking, passionate film waiting to be made about our ridiculous rights of way system and the legalised vandalism it vindicates. But this wasn't it. Please someone, ban the BBC from the Peak Park.
If you missed the programme and want to be exasperated, it's now on iPlayer at www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b016psp6/Tales_from_the_National_Parks_The_Peak_District/
