New cycle route plans are a demand-led assault on New Forest
Cycle routes expansion plans
Two crucial reports on the New Forest and its use by the public were dominated by an overriding principle – that management should avoid demand-led supply in the matter of recreation facilities. Only by this means could the special qualities of the Forest be protected. Of the two reports (1970 and 1986), the former was remarkable in actually turning back the tide of damage, which was even then threatening to overwhelm the Forest. Wild camping was stopped and the motorists’ cherished enjoyment of the Forest through driving all over it was ended. In place of such abuses, camps and car parks were provided which, in those days of less intensive use, were just about tolerable. Even towards the end of the 20th century the line was held and there were further small gains for the Forest. For example, a heavily-used walking trail through Mark Ash and the adjoining woods was finally closed down because so much safety felling of ancient oak and beech was needed to keep it open. A number of the most damaging car parks in the most peaceful parts of the Forest were also quietly shut down, restoring an element of peace to their surroundings.
Initially there were cries of rage in protest against all these good works, but the storm was weathered and a serious collapse in the Forest’s protection did not seem imminent until 2009. The Forestry Commission (FC) then apparently decided to try breaking down the specially protected tranquil areas. These were small zones of the Forest which were then still little degraded by over-use, but were freely available to walkers. They were identified and mapped by the New Forest Committee. That was a sort of predecessor to the national park, and its tranquillity report was the best piece of work the committee ever did. FC, it seems, resented the zones because they limited its freedom to encourage recreational use and development. Accordingly, early in 2009, it supported an attack on the largest and most crucial of the tranquil areas. That lies west of Fritham and runs through to Hyde and Ibsley. It sought to drive through it two new cycle routes which, if they had been successfully established, would quickly have become the most intensively used biking facility in the Forest. The Forest community was horrified and the verderers vetoed the proposal. The amenity verderer at the time, Peter Frost, was prominent in the opposition to the routes. That was not quite the end of the story, because four years later the authorities tried again to revive one of the routes, together with other new ones across the Forest. Clive Chatters, who now holds Peter Frost’s former position, opposed that second attempt on behalf of the Hampshire Wildlife Trust. Fortunately, it fell at the first fence.
I don’t think FC (now Forestry England or FE) ever really accepted its defeat in trying to downgrade the tranquil areas. Following the explosion of demand for recreation during Covid, and perhaps even before that, the tranquil area between Fritham and Hyde has been repeatedly hired out for huge running and other sporting events and I suppose the Forest should have anticipated what was to come.
In September this year, FE applied to the verderers once again to drive through the cycle routes rejected in 2009, namely Fritham to Holly Hatch Cottage and Fritham to Ogdens. This time they added a third and equally destructive route. That would run from a car park on the B3078 at Ashley Walk, through Stonequarry Bottom, over Cockley Hill, through Pitts Wood and on to Hampton Ridge. If they are successful in this, the original tranquil area will be broken up into five or six small pieces instead of its present two. Easy trespass between the routes across the remainder of the area will effectively destroy any remaining sense of peacefulness and remoteness.
The present proposals for the northern tranquil area are not the full extent of FE’s ambitions, all of which are strongly supported by tourist organisations, cycle businesses, biking clubs and individual enthusiasts. That would, of course, be a perfectly reasonable attitude if the primary purpose of the New Forest is to provide recreation, sport and profitability for the local economy, without regard to the priorities of national park purposes and the protective policies of the verderers. The drive now is for more than 30 new routes spread across the Forest, to be added to the 124 miles already approved, and the vast network of lanes, byways and bridleways which create a dense spider’s web within and around the perambulation. The New Forest should be rather more than just the urban recreation ground upon which FE seems intent on creating.
I do not question that the demand for more and more cycle routes exists. Indeed, it is unending. FE is supporting this classic demand-led assault on the Forest and it happens to fit well with its own philosophy of usually giving the visitor (and some residents) what they want, whether in the form of food vans, permits for huge sporting events or wider and deeper penetration of cycle routes into the depths of the Forest.
At the October court, the Verderers heard arguments for and against the plans and, at the moment, the programme is for a decision to be announced in January, subject to all necessary statutory consultations being completed in time.
Destruction at Little Linford
It is less than two years ago that terrible damage was done to the Open Forest at Turf Hill by the reckless hauling of timber during exceptionally wet weather. That work cut up a large area of heathland, destroyed tracks and did irreparable damage to an important group of archaeological sites. I suppose everyone hoped that lessons had been learned and that it would not happen again – but it has. This time the wrecking has been outside one of the smallest of the Forest’s inclosures, on the western boundary near Ringwood. The inclosure is called Little Linford and it is only about 62 acres in extent. This wood was first planted in 1846 and probably most of it was originally stocked with oak. A few of these original trees survive around the north-west part of the plantation at a place which has one of the strangest placenames in the Forest – Yearnagates Nap. That is a little hill whose top is surrounded by an ancient defensive earthwork. Rather strangely, the name is misplaced too far south by the Ordnance Survey on its large-scale maps.
Most of the original oak must have been felled by the end of the Second World War. It was replaced, largely in 1953, with Douglas fir. These now huge trees are being felled in large numbers. The operators, presumably completely unsupervised, decided to drag out the timber in appallingly wet conditions and they did so not within the plantation, but across first-class grazing land on the open Forest. A swathe over 700m long was reduced to deep ruts and a sea of mud. It is reminiscent of the sort of vandalism which used to occur 60 years ago. Of course such activity should have been stopped immediately the consequences became clear, and I don’t think it should have been permitted at all on the open Forest. What damage has been done within the inclosure I do not know. A brief visit on 19th October suggests that the defensive earthwork has survived intact, but there are three or four other historic sites within the wood that have yet to be looked at.
It is really a very strange world where the driver of a family car parked on a hard, dry verge is condemned for potentially damaging the site of special scientific interest, when hardly a blade of grass is affected, while timber hauling in Somme-like conditions across over 700m of Forest vegetation is condoned or at least tolerated by local management. It must also raise serious questions about the even-handedness of Natural England.
The photograph shows the damage looking west from Yearnagates Nap towards the timber stacks on the lawn beside Linford Brook.
Charged-for parking on the Forest’s common land
Hampshire County Council is to conduct a very interesting, if not well-thought-through, experiment in car park charging on one of its properties near Fordingbridge. The property in question is Hyde Common, and it is part of the open grazing land of the Forest (technically an adjacent common). The distant history of the common is quite complicated, but by post-war years I think that most of its 130 acres or so was controlled by gravel companies who hoped to exploit its rich reserves of hoggin. However, the common is surrounded on all sides by housing, and the owners would have provided formidable opposition to any planning application. Then, as planning policies tightened and conservation restrictions were applied to the Forest, the commercial owners decided that the battle would be unwinnable. Exactly how the council acquired the common I do not know, but presumably it involved purchase or gift. Initially after the acquisition it was quite well managed, but in recent years it has been much neglected. It is heavily grazed and, like the National Trust’s commons on the east side of the Forest, its once fine expanses of heather are being eliminated.
At its eastern end, Hyde Common abuts on the Crown land of the original New Forest. Here, in the early days of its ownership, the council established a large tourist and dog walkers’ car park which is very heavily used. It is also rather a blot on the landscape when viewed from the Latchmore valley below. The park is very popular with both locals and visitors who use it as a base for getting into the Forest proper. It is one of three car parks on council-owned common land in the vicinity, while in the Crown land adjoining there are over 100 such parks scattered across the Forest from Blackfield to Godshill.
The council has decided that this former gravel pit park (they call it Abbotswell) will shortly become a paying car park. It will be the only such facility in the entire New Forest. Paying for parking in such a beautiful place as the New Forest is probably very good value for money and certainly not something I object to in principle. It is, however, worse than useless when applied piecemeal rather than as a comprehensive scheme covering all parks together with legal and physical restraint on verge parking. No doubt the council will at first be able to secure a little income from unsuspecting visitors unfamiliar with the area, but at the first sniff of a parking meter, all the local dog walkers, runners, bikers and other users will simply decamp to the wide verges, private access roads and nearby free parks across the common. That might improve the view from Latchmore, but I don’t think it will achieve much else.
