Advice on rights of way and access

[SheffieldLass]

We've got a big access issue in the brewing, covering over a hundred hectares of land. At the moment we are trying to establish some facts, but we have alerted the National Park to the loss of access.

This land has almost no definitive rights of way across it. It has a few of the 'green dot' routes, which are quite clearly very important communication routes between villlages and hamlets, and which are always in use by walkers, cyclists, horse riders, and most of them also with vehicles.

Definitive rights of way footpaths and bridleways meet this area of land but do not continue through it (on the maps that is) but then re-appear the other side. People have been using this land freely for over 50 years, and have been using many tracks and paths across it, and wandering at will, where the plant growth hasn't been too impenetrable. These paths may have been diverted by the land use over time from the original routes that would have crossed the site, but they do link up with the rights of way on either side.

Where might we get good advice on how to try to establish these routes across the land as definitive rights of way? There is also the other issue of whether the open access which people have enjoyed for decades can just be revoked at the placing of a few discrete signs ....

Contact names and email addresses for the Ramblers etc would be very useful (PM me).

Thanks

[poschiavanus]

IIRC 20 years of unimpeded use is needed to establish a public right of way (PRoW). Unimpeded is taken to mean no signs saying it's private, no closures (e.g., token 1 day a year closure which some places use to show that it is not a right but a permission), and enough evidence to state the case (documentary as well as witness statements).

If the area concerned is in S or W Yorkshire than the Peak and Northern Footpath Society might be a good place to start. Also the (West) Yorkshire Ramblers local group seem very active. Certainly a local lobby group with decent contacts with the relevant Highway Authority will have more traction than Ramblers head office.

If its in a National Park and was not designated as open access land then its likely that there are known issues about the site.

[eeyore]

Originally Posted by SheffieldLass

Where might we get good advice on how to try to establish these routes across the land as definitive rights of way? There is also the other issue of whether the open access which people have enjoyed for decades can just be revoked at the placing of a few discrete signs ....

Contact names and email addresses for the Ramblers etc would be very useful (PM me).

Thanks

one of the consultants on the iprow list would be a good place to start as would ramblers etc

basically you'd have to show that the rights of way existed as public rights prior to the establishment of the definitive map in 1949 and were missed off in error and/or show that the routes have been in regular public use with no attempt to stop it by the landowner

use by private groups doesnt cut it and neither does trespass.

[SheffieldLass]

Thanks both of you. Useful info.

I suspect the new discrete signs are there to try to put the cat back in the bag before people realise the cat has been out of the bag for quite some time ....

[Johnny Redgate]

I've heard the government was proposing to "close" the definitive map for the establishment of new PROWs. Did that happen/is it going to happen?

[eeyore]

Originally Posted by Johnny Redgate

I've heard the government was proposing to "close" the definitive map for the establishment of new PROWs. Did that happen/is it going to happen?

that was brought in in the NERC act 2006 and will happen in 2026, so 15 years to go

just to be clear thats the cut off for claiming that rights of way should have been registered in 1949 and werent (and claiming higher rights on existing PRoW should have been registered and werent) , however after 2026 it will still be possible to register a new PRoW by dedication , or by demonstrating significant public use without let or hinderance (that is without it either being a permissive path or without the landowner trying to prevent it)

[Johnny Redgate]

Originally Posted by eeyore

that was brought in in the NERC act 2006 and will happen in 2026, so 15 years to go

just to be clear thats the cut off for claiming that rights of way should have been registered in 1949 and werent (and claiming higher rights on existing PRoW should have been registered and werent) , however after 2026 it will still be possible to register a new PRoW by dedication , or by demonstrating significant public use without let or hinderance (that is without it either being a permissive path or without the landowner trying to prevent it)

Thanks for that, though I'm not greatly relieved. Would I be right in thinking that the cut off applies to claims for upgrading PROWs that were wrongly defined under the 1949 act e.g. public footpaths to public bridleways?

[eeyore]

Originally Posted by Johnny Redgate

Would I be right in thinking that the cut off applies to claims for upgrading PROWs that were wrongly defined under the 1949 act e.g. public footpaths to public bridleways?

and crucially footpaths and bridleways to byways - yes

thats what i meant about higher rights

LARA and TRF are not happy bunnies about that development.

[Johnny Redgate]

Oh yes, sorry. Didn't read carefully enough.

[SheffieldLass]

What (if anything) is happening with the 'green dot' routes? With landowners trying to say that no-one should use them, whilst the users say that everyone can use them, they are really unsatisfactory. You don't know what you can do on them. Are they to remain as these vague use routes, or are they awaiting a decision but that no-one has yet sat down and really researched their history of use to come to a considered decision?

Our local volunteer rangers were told on their access course to view these routes as BOATs, which nearly all the ones round us appear to be. Most connect directly to roads at both ends and they link villages and hamlets as the most direct route, (often the only other route by metalled roads involve a circuituous one of an extra 10-15 miles or so, not the sort of thing people would have done lightly in the days of horse drawn carts/horseback) ... or they appear to be the main routes for driving animals out to the moors i.e. they link the villages to their named moors, and go there directly, not meandering about.