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Off road menace

Woodface

pfm Member
I don’t want to pollute the Range Rover thread with this but the singer of off road bikes & quads was raised. I have just read a piece in the local free paper whereby 77 incidents were recorded on a single Sunday in the NW of Sheffield.

For those not aware of the area, Sheffield has large green spaces within its boundaries (80 ancient woodlands no less) & is very attractive to a certain kind of off roader.

Ok, so nothing new but what surprised me was that some of the bikes seized were owned & ridden by pro enduro riders. Reason for seizure? No license & insurance.

This is pretty disgraceful & hardly sets a good example.
 
As someone who does (or at least used to) ride off-road bikes (including a bit of competitive Enduro racing back in the day) then the unlicensed riders riding in areas where they shouldn't be was also a pet hate of mine. I have ridden in the hills near Sheffield but we stuck to route we were legally allowed to be on, and were all riding road legal trail or enduro bikes. Unfortunately the general public is a lot more used to seeing illegal riders, so we used to get some hassle - despite being 100% legal and riding with consideration for others using the trails.
 
Coming down from the top of Cnicht between the lockdowns and there were fresh scrambler tracks. I've been at the car park for Cwmorthin and seen a posse of bikes evading the gates, so guess these are local and from Blaenau Ffestiniog. Anyone want to invent a sport taking these c*nts out with a high-powered rifle?
 
No license

LicenCe (noun) and licenSe (verb) in British English. Sorry, not off-road but certainly off-topic and probably offhand; maybe off-side, off-course and offbeat but I would never mean to off end. :D

I only know Sheffield shopping centre (very elongated, from memory). Still have a pair of fancy Italian shoes bought there on one of my retail survey runs. Unfortunately too tight, even then, so still new from 40+ years ago! Missed the green spaces, it seems.
 
As someone who does (or at least used to) ride off-road bikes (including a bit of competitive Enduro racing back in the day) then the unlicensed riders riding in areas where they shouldn't be was also a pet hate of mine. I have ridden in the hills near Sheffield but we stuck to route we were legally allowed to be on, and were all riding road legal trail or enduro bikes. Unfortunately the general public is a lot more used to seeing illegal riders, so we used to get some hassle - despite being 100% legal and riding with consideration for others using the trails.
I don’t have a problem with road legal riders although it never ceases to amaze how rare a full sized number plate appears on a bike;)
 
I don’t have a problem with road legal riders although it never ceases to amaze how rare a full sized number plate appears on a bike;)

All my bikes have full size plates, including my enduro race bike. I've never seen the point of the small ones (or loud exhausts for that matter) as it just gives the police an excuse to stop you.
 
All my bikes have full size plates, including my enduro race bike. I've never seen the point of the small ones (or loud exhausts for that matter) as it just gives the police an excuse to stop you.
I see a lot of small plates when out in the Peaks, area attracts a certain type...
 
I missed out the most amusing part, they followed them with a drone so just called round his house & seized his wheels. I quite like the idea of the rider thinking he was the dogs danglies outrunning the coppers...

That is a decent approach, as long as the rider doesn't notice the drone!
 
Dealt with several life altering collisions on public byways, private land and other areas regarding off-road bikes and quads - several with no docs and also riding like idiots. They felt they were immune form the wider consequences.
 
Dealt with several life altering collisions on public byways, private land and other areas regarding off-road bikes and quads - several with no docs and also riding like idiots. They felt they were immune form the wider consequences.

An awful lot of those bikes are also stolen. I usually to occasionally commute on one of my off-road race bikes (a Honda CRM250R that I used in trail bike events) and there were more attempts to steal that than all the other bikes I've owned put together. Never successful (as I used several locks), and in two cases caught in the act by the police, but with occasional damage.
 
It's becoming a problem where I live, public footpaths churned up by Herberts on Enduro bikes and Pick Up driving Neandrathals letting their off spring tear up the place on Mini Quad Bikes. As a former biker it really annoys me that these dickheads get all bikers tarred with the same brush. Local plod try to help but they're over stretched and have bigger fish to fry most of the time.

Cheers BB
 
I reported someone to the police a few days ago. 6 houses away, thinking it is fine to ride on public footpaths and a farmers fields.
They actually own some land next to their house which they ride on.
 
An awful lot of those bikes are also stolen. I usually to occasionally commute on one of my off-road race bikes (a Honda CRM250R that I used in trail bike events) and there were more attempts to steal that than all the other bikes I've owned put together. Never successful (as I used several locks), and in two cases caught in the act by the police, but with occasional damage.

TBEC?
 
We've had a spate of quad bikes doing donuts in our winter wheat during the snow. Without witnesses you can't do anything. Have also seen numerous motor bikes ripping up restricted byways and footpaths and inadequate nerds in 4wds storming around on permit only byways where the locks have been vandalised.

All non agricultural motor vehicles need to be banned from byways and enforcement automated. Byways round here (North downs way in kent) are now pretty much useless to cyclists and walkers for much of the winter. I was also staggered to read that some idiots are hawking 4wd rides slap bang in the middle of the lake district national park. Oil can't run out soon enough.
 
A few years ago there was a major Enduro competition locally. It was necessary to ride on public roads to go between sections. All riders obviously should have had road legal bikes suitably licenced and insured. Many of the riders had "mini" number plates, resulting in some attention from the traffic police monitoring the event. The riders argued that it had been allowed at other events by other police forces.

PNC checks discovered that many of the number plates were in fact fictional and that the bikes were therefore uninsured. The event was called off halfway through day one.

The subsequent runnings of this Enduro are now run entirely off road in a Forestry Commission forest.
 


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