off-roading on green lanes in Protected Landscapes
Published 23 August 2024
What’s wrong with a bit of motoring?
When you walk on a quiet hill track, perhaps in the Lake District, and are suddenly faced with the roar of motorbikes or a menacing convoy of large 4x4s, there is no doubt in your mind that this is fundamentally wrong: we walk in National Parks because we want to experience nature, not exhaust fumes and the noise of loud engines.
But perhaps this is just a personal preference? Should we not learn how to share with the off-road enthusiasts, who have their own way of appreciating nature?
The fact that this question is even considered shows how far we have drifted from the original intent behind the creation of National Parks. Henry Strauss, a Parliamentary Secretary to the Ministry of Town and Country Planning, summed up the need for protected landscapes in 1942: “We are a large population living in a small island of matchless but most vulnerable beauty. It is reckless folly to squander and destroy it.” This is the kind of advocacy that gave birth to National Parks.
John Dower’s 1945 report, one of the foundational documents of National Parks, clearly articulated how visitors should behave: “…those who come to National Parks should be such as wish to enjoy and cherish the beauty and quietude of unspoilt country and to take their recreation, active or passive, in ways that do not impair the beauty or quietude, nor spoil the enjoyment of them by others.”
Similarly, in 1974 Lord Sandford, author of the now statutory Sandford principle, wrote: “We should say at this juncture, for the avoidance of doubt, that recreational uses of national parks must be compatible with the qualities of the parks, among which …. a sense of tranquillity and of contact with nature seem to us to be of especial value. Accordingly noisy pursuits will nearly always be out of place in national parks …”
A 2019 survey by the Lake District National Park Authority underlines to what extent the noisy pursuit of driving 4x4s and motorbikes on green lanes disrupts this sense of tranquillity and diminishes the enjoyment of nature.
Green lane driving = nature depletion
But there is more at stake than our relationship with nature. In a letter to the Lake District National Park Authority, 45 leading environmental scientists warned the Authority about the environmental impact of motoring on green lanes and called for urgent action to curb this activity.
There is a growing body of scientific evidence, showing how motoring on green lanes contributes to nature depletion – you can read a summary here.
- As Campaign for National Parks Health Check points out, National Parks are currently among the last refuges for many species on the brink of being lost from the UK. We need to ensure they become the places from which these species recover and are able to spread.
- Off-road motor vehicles significantly contribute to erosion on green lanes.
- Erosion in turn leads to run-off and sedimentation in nearby watercourses.
- Off-road vehicles on unsealed roads are likely to have a negative effect on biodiversity, through habitat fragmentation, dust and noise.
- Climate change exacerbates the impact of green lane motoring.
Campaign for National Parks Health Check reports that 83% of the public support Britain’s National Parks being made wilder. Driving on green lanes just for the fun of it does the opposite: it extends the road network into the heart of some of our National Parks and wipes out many of the benefits we get from nature.
Green lanes are our pathways to tranquillity and wellbeing. At a time of increasing threats to nature, it would be folly not to protect them against motorised tourism.