Keeping footpaths usable

AudlemOnline has been sent news of a campaign that aims to ensure footpaths can be used the way they are meant to be. A Ramblers Society campaign has started and a report says:

Britain has 140,000 miles of footpaths, which sounds a lot – but, as local authority budgets get smaller, more and more paths are overgrown, impassable (stinging nettles must be the most numerous plant in the country) or undetectable.

And that's just through neglect. In some areas, unscrupulous landowners are deliberately obscuring or obstructing ancient rights of way – dismantling signposts, locking gates or posting "beware of the bull" notices where no such creature lurks – because they don't want weekending townies tramping over their land.

So the Ramblers have launched a six-month scheme called the Big Pathwatch. It's surprisingly high-tech, given that the usual image of a rambler is a cagouled 70-year-old with tweed trousers tucked into thick socks.

You download an app and, whenever you come across an obstructed footpath, you upload a photo to the Ramblers, which automatically gives the grid co-ordinates.

The link is on the ramblers website:
http://www.ramblers.org.uk/bigpathwatch

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