During December 2006, IMBA UK asked its members and supporters to cast votes on this website in order to give their views on how well the different parts of the UK were providing for mountainbikers. For voting purposes, the UK was divided into 24 areas based largely on Government Regions and National Parks. Members were asked to vote in any regions where they’d ridden regularly in 2006. A total of 340 votes had been received when polling closed on 1st January 2007.

Results

The voting results are shown graphically on four pages:-

• Summary – charts for each UK country, plus National Parks.
• England – charts for each English region, excluding National Parks.
• Scotland – charts for each Scottish region, excluding National Parks.
• National Parks – charts for each National Park.

Analysis

Scotland

• Scotland was confirmed as the top UK destination, both for purpose built trails and for open access routes.
• All Scottish regions performed well, an excellent reflection of joined up thinking and decision making, and a very positive endorsement of the support of the Forestry Commission and the Scottish Parliament.

Wales

• Wales firmly positions itself above England, both in terms of a usable byway and bridleway network and the popularity of the Forestry Commission and Tilhill Forestry trail centres.

England

• England is catching up with Welsh and Scottish trail centres, but almost in spite of any positive political encouragement from Westminster.
• It is evident that the recent Countryside Act has, as expected, produced few expectations of improvement to the byway and bridleway network in England and Wales for cyclists and equestrians.
• The two best performing regions were the East and Southeast, with the West Midlands providing the least positive assessment.
• Opinion was firmly divided in the East Midlands, no doubt highlighting the drawbacks of amalgamating differently performing counties for the purposes of the survey.

Northern Ireland

• Overall, Northern Ireland has a long way to go.
• With the state forestry service in Northern Ireland firmly stuck in a recreational dark ages, it is with great relief that we note the excellent initiative by Portland Cement to utilise a significant area of disused quarries for MTB and other recreation.

National Parks

• The byway and bridleway network in virtually all National Parks were rated very highly, with six of the eleven parks assessed getting all “green” scores, reassuringly reflecting the higher budgets generally available for rights of way maintenance.
• Dartmoor NP was the major exception, where mountain bikers quite rightly expressed their indignation at being regarded as criminals by the Dartmoor bylaws, although it is recognised that the National Park has made considerable efforts to provide legal opportunities to offset this rather petty piece of local legislation.
• Northumberland NP also was out of line with the general positive trend, and it is hoped that improvement will be noted in future surveys.

Our thanks to all who took part in the survey. It is our intention that this will become an annual event so that we can track progress across the UK. IMBA welcomes comments and suggestions for improvements that can can be considered for future surveys.