So it transpires the real reason for the closure application wasn't security, but expansion?
The allegation that 400 of BMW's own employees who used the path daily posed a security threat was therefore not only groundless, but also I assume libellous towards those employees.
As for the magistrates... remind me of the Sheriff in the Gloag debacle nort of the border.
Good on them...Who on earth wants to walk around that part of Oxford?! We should not worry so much about inner-city walkways, as opening access to real walks in the country.
I've seen this mentality in NZ, and it lead to nothing but grief for most true walkers.
I know I'll be flamed by this, but the only grief I ever get when hiking is from ramblers who want "open access". What good is open access past a car-making industrial plant?! Sound like the Council should step in and defend it's PROW network, and nothing to do with tramping.Warrick
What good is open access past a car-making industrial plant?
On the face of it, yeah, it sounds pretty dire walking past a car-making plant. But if the alternative is walking past a car-making plant by road, or worse, along a busy main road with no pavement or grassy verge, then I'd be for keeping the path.
I suppose it depends what sort of walking you do, but sometimes you're bound to find yourself following a path past a factory, housing estate, rubbish dump, sewage works, or whatever. In a crowded place like Britain, you'll do it far more often than in NZ, but that shouldn't suggest that such paths are useless. I've walked all over Britain, and I've walked all kinds of paths. I've walked from the centre of cities such as London, Liverpool and Newcastle, into the surrounding countryside, and I rely on all kinds of paths to keep me off the main roads, where some motorists have scant regard for anyone on foot.
On the face of it, yeah, it sounds pretty dire walking past a car-making plant. But if the alternative is walking past a car-making plant by road, or worse, along a busy main road with no pavement or grassy verge, then I'd be for keeping the path.
That's fair enough - guess I was not thinking of the "network" part of this.
While I can't get too excited about a path through an industrial area, if I lived in NZ I would probably also take a more pro-active approach given the woeful state of ROW issues there.
Warrick, you're reasoning is pretty skewed and smacks of walker elitism. In any case it's the principle that's being ridden (or should that be driven) over here.
Paddy and Fergal seem to me to be on the right track! (pun intended)
I personally would probably avoid a path running near to an industrial complex , if I possible could, but we should all be alarmed at such developments as that above and the previously reported Gloag case.
I tend to stick to upland walking and I live in the right area for that where I can enjoy my walking miles from the industrial scars of the land, so I am lucky.
As Paddy has pointed out, he and others do indeed walk such paths, and from necessity of where they walk or live, not from some "rent a protester" anti progress and anti establishment stance, which is how the media sometimes label such protesters.
Fergal relates to the "principle" of the issue, and he is quite right. There are two main concerns tied up here. Can large corporations like BMW and wealthy Scottish land owners like Gloag ride roughshod over such principles and get the law of the land changed for their "convenience?"
These judgments would seem to suggest so.
The second element is if we do not "care" equally for the "rights" of all walkers (horse riders etc) and carry on with our selfish "I'm all right jack" attitude, we then allow such corporations and rich individuals to change the emphasis surrounding such decisions, and then, how long would it be before OUR own personal freedoms are threatened.
While I get annoyed at path problems, I admit that I don't get worked up about them to the point where I'd become an active campaigner. Instead, I pay my subs to the Ramblers because they have all the lobbying skills that I lack, and they have a pretty good record at getting the job done.
Regardless of where it runs, and whether it's a picturesque area, the path in question is an ancient right of way following the course of a Roman Road. It's been around since the days of carts and chariots, and should have been preserved as part of our heritage.
The greatest irony here is that most public rights of way that are not made up highways exist because they were essential access routes to people's places of employment in the past and were unlikely to be challenged by big business in the days when people had mainly to walk to work.
