Massive sell-off of Forestry Commission land in England

cooldad

Fuck off Yeehaa.

Got it. Thanks.

Northwind

yeehaamcgee wrote:

Sorry, but that's just blowhard bollocks. There is very little evidence that the way trail centres exist currently, brings substantial money into the surrounding area. The centre itself may benefit, but nowhere else.

Look up the Laggan study, it's the best presented case I know of. Vast local benefits outwith the centre.

yeehaamcgee wrote:

I don't know anything about Afan, but do you think it looks like anybody going there to ride is spending money anywhere else?

Yes, they all sleep in ditches and eat only what they can catch You can't actually believe that biking doesn't bring benefits to the areas can you? I doubt it, you're not an idiot. Just acting like one for some daft reason.

cooldad

We do sleep in ditches, where we eat the remains of Sheeps last victim, head and all.

Northwind

You know you'll be eating secondhand Sheepsteeth manfat that way, right?

When I was in Wales we stayed in a bunkhouse that only exists because of bike tourism, ate in the local pubs restaurants and chippies (and once in a trail centre cafe), shopped in the corner shops, bought bits from local bike shops. And when we wanted victims we went and got our own, no sloppy seconds

bails87

andyrm wrote:

typically left leaning news media

:shock:
I'm not sure how The Sun, Daily Mail, Telegraph or Times could be considered particularly left leaning, but it's all relative I suppose. But leaving aside my pet hate of lies and distortion in the right wing media....


As for trail centres, if it was accompanied by a change in England and Wales to match the Scottish access laws then maybe it won't be so bad.

But as it is, I've got pretty much zero half decent riding near me, even if I could legally ride bridleways, that wouldn't change. Cannock Chase is fantastic to have only an hours drive away. If that was sold off and access for bikers was either stopped, or became much more expensive then I'd be reduced to riding towpaths every weekend, and then I'd probably just throw myself in the canal to end the misery!

At the moment I pay $3 (pretend the $ is a pound sign, I'm in Laos, and the funky keyboards here don't have one!) for parking, I buy food either at the trail centre or in the town, I use over $10 of petrol, and then $10 of toll fees too (avoidable, but the M6 is rubbish). I've then got the hassle of loading the bike and all my kit into a 106, and then driving for an hour each way. It's actually a fair bit of effort, but I think people with good natural riding nearby think that everyone has that, and we're being lazy by using trail centres. Believe me, if I could ride anything good out of my front door I would, but I'm in the middle of flat suburbia, so trail centres are a godsend. I love the Long Mynd too actually, but that's over an hour and a half away, and lots of it is fairly tame, non-technical stuff.

But this isn't about natural vs trail centres, it's more about the effect that this could have on access to good riding (especially for those of us not lucky enough to live in the Highlands, or the Welsh mountains). Hopefully the red sock brigade will get involved in trying to stop the sale too, although their access to other land is better than ours, they could at least be a powerful voice against these kind of silly measures which the right wing media has convinced everyone is necessary (sorry andyrm if you want to get money for the gov't, how about making Vodafone pay the several billion pounds of tax that they owe, rather than just letting them forget about it because they're old pals with the chancellor....)

Anonymous

Nope, I can't see any economic growth round here due to any outdoor pursuit industries. Take somewhere like Llanberis, and the nearby areas. They're still incredibly poor areas, despite having tens, if not hundreds of thousands of visitors to the region.
Then there's Dolgellau, near Coed y Brenin, which is also still an economic craphole, despite huge quantities of MTbers just up the road.
There's just nothing on offer to make the visitors open their wallets.
Yet, year after year we get spoonfed the same old bull about how the economy of an area is doing well, when there's just no evidence.

cooldad

Had a look at some of your pics in Routes. Awesome mountains, make our Surrey hills look a bit insipid. Might come and unload some southern boodle up there next summer, toss some coppers to the natives etc.

bails87

But how much more of a craphole would those places be without the visitors?

And how do people say that the economy is improving without any evidence, and not just get shot down, or presented with the actual evidence that shows the opposite?

Anonymous

bails87 wrote:

But how much more of a craphole would those places be without the visitors?

And how do people say that the economy is improving without any evidence, and not just get shot down, or presented with the actual evidence that shows the opposite?

how do they say bullshite like that and repeatedly get away with it? Because nobody believes a word the press, or the politicians say anymore, to the point that nobody cares of even listens, of even expects the truth.
These towns were downtrodden since their beginnings, as mostly mining towns. There is virtually no commerce. There's a couple of chippies, and small shops, but that's all.
Head a handfull of miles down the road to Bangor, where there's actually some work to be found, and the shops are thriving. But these have nothing to do with trail centres. Their economy is however grouped with poor towns to make things look impressive.

andyrm

yeehaamcgee wrote:

Danny-T wrote:

Be interested to know how much tourism was at afan pre trail centre. There surely must be benefit to local economy of trail centres, why else would there be so much being poured into the welsh centres?

So that the FC can make money out of them?

I don't know anything about Afan, but do you think it looks like anybody going there to ride is spending money anywhere else?

Totally. Look at Aviemore for an example how the model could work. I go a few times a year at different times including summer, so it's not just snow that draws people there. I reckon they have it pretty bang on in terms of a UK resort model with hotels, b&bs, pubs and places to eat, plus good parking. Also look at where most trail centres are, there's usually old quarries or reservoirs in the same vicinity, so all of a sudden you have a viable outdoor sports resort with walking, watersports, mountain biking and the apres sport aspects all in one place. I know that if such a place existed, me, my mrs and most of our friends would be up to go for long weekend trips. I imagine we're not alone in that....

Danny-T

yeehaamcgee wrote:

Danny-T wrote:

I don't know anything about Afan, but do you think it looks like anybody going there to ride is spending money anywhere else?

Several B&Bs, a seemingly popular visitor centre, always packed bike-shop, Cafe, showers, bike wash, campsite. It's no canary wharf but without the investments in MTB I'd say there'd be a good hundred or so less employed people around there when you take into account the FC roles*.

*A figure pulled completely out of my arse and based solely on my ill-educated opinion. But as someone who lives in a really under-serviced MTB forest (New Forest) I take note of these things in the vein hope that I'll some day get to put a case to some unsuspecting authority to have something remotely trail centre-esque here.

andyrm

Danny-T wrote:

yeehaamcgee wrote:

Danny-T wrote:

I don't know anything about Afan, but do you think it looks like anybody going there to ride is spending money anywhere else?

Several B&Bs, a seemingly popular visitor centre, always packed bike-shop, Cafe, showers, bike wash, campsite. It's no canary wharf but without the investments in MTB I'd say there'd be a good hundred or so less employed people around there when you take into account the FC roles*.

*A figure pulled completely out of my ars* and based solely on my ill-educated opinion. But as someone who lives in a really under-serviced MTB forest (New Forest) I take note of these things in the vein hope that I'll some day get to put a case to some unsuspecting authority to have something remotely trail centre-esque here.

Exactly – but in reality, Afan as a “resort” massively undersells itself. Imagine just how much the local economy could boom if they branded themselves up properly, formed a coherent marketing strategy for the town and area etc. Something like this for example: http://www.whistler.com/winter_packages ... k&kw=deals

Northwind

yeehaamcgee wrote:

Then there's Dolgellau, near Coed y Brenin, which is also still an economic craphole, despite huge quantities of MTbers just up the road. There's just nothing on offer to make the visitors open their wallets.

EXACTLY. Dolgellau, as well as being pronounced wrongly, does nothing to make people spend their money there. There's a bike shop but it's not easy to find (and only had road bikes in the window), there's a chip shop that we ate at but that's it. They're not making any attempt to capitalise on the mtb dollar. Their lookout.

Now look at Machynlleth. You've got Holey Trail on the main street, you've got the bunkhouse, you've got most of the other B&Bs and hotels being "bike friendly", and most importantly you've got advertising and local trails to draw people there. It's not huge but they've got a flow of mtb visitors and money. Not to mention that the centres employ people, they don't import all those cafe and shop staff etc. They've sought the business and earned it.

Or look at Laggan The community was behind the project from day one and now they have an mtb-based economy.

Or look at Peebles and Innerleithen. Or just about anywhere else there's a major biking attraction.

andyrm

Northwind wrote:

yeehaamcgee wrote:

Then there's Dolgellau, near Coed y Brenin, which is also still an economic craphole, despite huge quantities of MTbers just up the road. There's just nothing on offer to make the visitors open their wallets.

EXACTLY. Dolgellau, as well as being pronounced wrongly, does nothing to make people spend their money there. There's a bike shop but it's not easy to find (and only had road bikes in the window), there's a chip shop that we ate at but that's it. They're not making any attempt to capitalise on the mtb dollar. Their lookout.

Now look at Machynlleth. You've got Holey Trail on the main street, you've got the bunkhouse, you've got most of the other B&Bs and hotels being "bike friendly", and most importantly you've got advertising and local trails to draw people there. It's not huge but they've got a flow of mtb visitors and money. Not to mention that the centres employ people, they don't import all those cafe and shop staff etc. They've sought the business and earned it.

Or look at Laggan The community was behind the project from day one and now they have an mtb-based economy.

Or look at Peebles and Innerleithen. Or just about anywhere else there's a major biking attraction.

But imagine how much bigger it could be - if the forestry land was then operated by a commercial entity with all the small service companies (hotels, B&Bs, outdoor sports shops etc etc) as stakeholders in that business, having a vested interest in the commercial success of the resort.

Anonymous

GhallTN6 wrote:

I can see it going one way or the other.. "private property - no access" or "£5 per bike per trail"

Given the complexity and costs of insurances and the liabilities involved, I'd say the former.

However they have to police it and stick up enough signs. You can trespass in this country and it's not a criminal offence to do so. You can be prosecuted through civil courts, but it's down to the landowner to actually do something about it. Usually "get orf my land". This is how walkers won the right to footpaths.

As I've mentioned in other threads, what I believe should happen is liability should be removed from the landowner with the biker made to accept all liability if they ride on private land. If there's an accident, they can't sue, if an ambulance has to churn up the land to get to you, then you are liable for the costs, etc.

That way the land owners may be less bothered about you being there.

All that said, FC land already is technically fairly restrictive except for trail centres, and most are private land just run by the FC.

yeehaamcgee wrote:

cooldad wrote:

I'd rather commercialism stayed out of it. Prefer riding natural trails anyway. Cafes, bike wash, shops, sodding McTrails.

Well if you ride natural trails anyway, since you're so awesome, then it's not going to affect you then is it?
So fuck off. Troll.

Sheesh, who stuck a bug up your arse?

Northwind

andyrm wrote:

But imagine how much bigger it could be - if the forestry land was then operated by a commercial entity with all the small service companies (hotels, B&Bs, outdoor sports shops etc etc) as stakeholders in that business, having a vested interest in the commercial success of the resort.

Perhaps. But then the Peebles example shows that most of the local businesses are happy to make money off it but not contribute at all. Commercial operators would be wanting to bring more of that stuff onsite I imagine which could reduce the benefit to local businesses.

Thing is, I'm not convinced it's a good model for UK biking- like I was saying earlier, we don't have the lifts or the mountains, so I don't think there's any way you're going to have single sites that can really be a centre of interest. The closest we've got are your Glentress/Innerleithens, your Afans and CYBs but even then how much riding is there really? A day and a half at CYB for example before you're duplicating rides. So you're dependant on distributed riding which is going to work against the resort idea.

So you've got north wales, say, where we went and did 5 rides in 5 days at 4 different places, and could have kept going like that- but if there was a "cycling resort" at CYB would that be benificial? It'd cut the benefit to the wider area if it concentrated riders, for one thing.

The alternative would be to build a hell of a lot more trails in the localised sites but I can't see that happening realistically, it just doesn't seem to make much sense without specific reasons for those localised trails (ie built around lift access). There's nothing wrong with either model I think, they both have advantages but trying to push an alpine resort model just doesn't seem to fit what we've got.

andyrm

Hence what I was saying about utilising the other facilities in the area too - the majority of the places I have been to in terms of trail centres etc have a disused quarry (climbing/rocksports/flooded bits form sailing lakes) nearby, so it's an all in outdoor resort. Include walking trails too like at Llandegla and all of a sudden it's a more attractive proposition I reckon.

Northwind

Mmm, fair enough. But see, I think that works on the current distributed approach. Fact is it's very hard to get local business to contribute, they're happy to take the benefits but I think you'd find it difficult to make them real stakeholders- Peebles is a great example of this, local business makes a fortune off the 2 trail centres but how do you get them to give anything back? They have a vested interest sure, but no compelling reason to invest, with a few exceptions. That's hard to get round. And I don't see that this'd change just because the centre was under commercial ownership.

The counterargument- and again, lets use Laggan here, there's lots of good info about them. The centre more than paid for itself within a year, the commercial benefits to the wider area outweighed the construction costs, which is incredible. But the centre itself doesn't actually make much money, the benefits are going to local business. Which is great, and justifies public funding for the project. But it wouldn't convice a private enterprise to build a similiar scheme without government funding. If you applied a pure private model to strathmashie, what you'd probably get is no trails at all.

weescott

"andyrm wrote:

Look at Aviemore for an example how the model could work. .

How to have a great location and not utilise its potential.

Now if the new Inners development kicks off that would be something to talk about! New trails based on Whistler! 8)

Chrisdawg

yeehaamcgee wrote:

lm_trek wrote:

I don't want to invoke any anger but surely there is a positive side to this as well?? Llandegla is a privately ran forest, has great facilities, yes the trail is currently weak but surely thats a good base model for anyone wanting to buy the FC land??

How do we know that any future buyers might not put money into new trails and develop MTB'ing even futher? I know its the great unknown but it could swing ether way.

Who says the trails are weak at Llandegla? There's a reason it's one of the most popular places. They've even opened a host of new sections in the last year. Not too shabby considering they nearly went bust over last year's incredible winter.

The forest is owned by UPA, and Oneplanet pay them for the privilege of using it, I think. It certainly shows there is another way to do it, without FC support.

UPM own the forest and lease the site to One Planet on a profit sharing basis. But it is utter bollocks to suggest that it was done without FC support, over £815K of FC grant was paid to get this thing off the ground, that does not include any other public /RSPB money, yes they put £15 grand into it as well. They will also get other FC money to manage the site

Dirtydog11

Call me cynical but it looks like the government are making available a form of tax relief for the rich.


Income tax
The income and profits from timber sales in woodlands managed commercially are free from both Income and Corporation Tax.

........................after two years of ownership, woodland is not subject to inheritance tax.


So once the land is sold it provides zero return for the taxpayer.

http://www.upm-tilhill.com/Woodland_for ... index.html

Mmmm nice if you can afford it!

Stevo_666

I think I'll call you cynical. Cost cutting maybe, but an attempt to make the rich richer? - doubt it, there are much easier ways. Besides, it assumes you can make a profit from woodland and if the FC was doing that they probably wouldn't be selling.

Though it's a less outrageous theory than Bails' theory about Vodafone getting 'let off' a massive tax bill....

GhallTN6

Woodland in East Sussex seems to be going for about £6000 an acre

So if half of the FC is sold off, that's 925,000 acres apparently, then the government could rake in about 5.5 billion alone in the sale (can someone double check that), then of course there is the cost saving on mangement and admin of those sold off woodlands.

but knowing the government, they'll try and shift if cheap at half the price, but this woodland is worth more than it's worth in gold!!

Northwind

GhallTN6 wrote:

Woodland in East Sussex seems to be going for about £6000 an acre

So if half of the FC is sold off, that's 925,000 acres apparently, then the government could rake in about 5.5 billion alone in the sale (can someone double check that), then of course there is the cost saving on mangement and admin of those sold off woodlands.

Saturating the market's going to make a bit of a difference in value though. That's one of the comically dishonest parts about this sell-off idea, the numbers being floated about are at best guesses and at worst knowingly wrong.

Herbie The Dog

If I had the cash I'd buy a load of forest and turn it into a MTB paradise. Shops, cafes (top, middle and bottom of the mountain/hill), skills areas, pump tracks, 4X track, trails for all levels, uplift blah blah.

I'd then ban hikers, dog walkers and cyclo-crossers. Hold races and other regular events like demo days.

Might see a return in my lifetime but I doubt it. Unfortuntely I don't have the cash so there's no chance of seeing McHerbie's MTB World anytime soon.

Maybe we could all chip in and buy something between us?

johnnygooner

Now I know this is overtly political and I know I'm gonna get some stick on here for this but this goes far beyond the wants and needs of people that ride mountain bikes. They're selling off publicly owned land. Mrs Thatch pulled off one of the greatest confidence tricks of all eternity in selling off publicly owned assets and utility companies. Lets not let the present incumbent attempt to emulate her. The rich already pay no taxes on the huge swathes of land they own and there are significant tax breaks to be had with land ownership, not least of all no actual requirement for the aristocracy to register their land ownership thus their real and taxable income can be shrouded in mystery. Reasonable estimates suggest two thirds of all land is owned by only 0.3% of the population in the UK. Acess and use of the land goes back to the Norman 'yoake', Winstanley and the Diggers.

At the risk of sounding like a green, lefty socialist, "land, the primary source of all real wealth, is the common heritage. We acknowledge that land is held in trust by human society on behalf of other species and future generations, and that land should not be treated as a capital investment nor traded for speculative profit"

There is lots more reading available on this. Try here http://libcom.org/news/article.php/land ... k-10032006 It wont take as long to read as a review on the latest kashima coated forks. Mmm they're buttery smooth. There, I've saved you that job as well!!

This will change the countryside forever if it goes through and once gone we wont ever get it back. An enjoyment of being out there is how we all got into mountain biking anyway. Please act in some way

Northwind

Herbie The Dog wrote:

Maybe we could all chip in and buy something between us?

That's the idea a lot of people are having. Actually some people have already done it on a small scale. Can't help but think there's better ways to do it though, land's so damn expensive. Maybe take out a 50 year lease on a forested hillside, that way you've just got the much smaller cost of trailbuilding and insurance. After all mostly what managed forestry is doing is growing quietly to itself. Planting, harvesting, brashing and sometimes thinning is about all it gets apart from that.

Or just be like Rik Allsop and find a landowner who'll let you do it. Drumlanrig makes a quiet profit off of parking and the shop lease (and mtb'ers making cakes) I reckon and the Duke already owned the land.

Phicon

how do we act? If it is to be put up for sale then the future of our countryside is literally at stake. We need to pool our collective resources, even finances, and secure the future of our land. Does anyone know which organisations are experienced in this kind of action?

johnnygooner has it right.

Dirtydog11

johnnygooner wrote:

Now I know this is overtly political and I know I'm gonna get some stick on here for this but this goes far beyond the wants and needs of people that ride mountain bikes. They're selling off publicly owned land. Mrs Thatch pulled off one of the greatest confidence tricks of all eternity in selling off publicly owned assets and utility companies. Lets not let the present incumbent attempt to emulate her. The rich already pay no taxes on the huge swathes of land they own and there are significant tax breaks to be had with land ownership, not least of all no actual requirement for the aristocracy to register their land ownership thus their real and taxable income can be shrouded in mystery. Reasonable estimates suggest two thirds of all land is owned by only 0.3% of the population in the UK. Acess and use of the land goes back to the Norman 'yoake', Winstanley and the Diggers.

At the risk of sounding like a green, lefty socialist, "land, the primary source of all real wealth, is the common heritage. We acknowledge that land is held in trust by human society on behalf of other species and future generations, and that land should not be treated as a capital investment nor traded for speculative profit"

There is lots more reading available on this. Try here http://libcom.org/news/article.php/land ... k-10032006 It wont take as long to read as a review on the latest kashima coated forks. Mmm they're buttery smooth. There, I've saved you that job as well!!

This will change the countryside forever if it goes through and once gone we wont ever get it back. An enjoyment of being out there is how we all got into mountain biking anyway. Please act in some way

+1

I would like to add that its not ours to sell, we are merely trustees.

We have no right selling off our childrens inheritance!


That's all.