Hurstwood Closure due to Ash Die back
Dear Friends, I’ve known for a long time that I’m ungovernable…I have a zero tolerance policy for unnecessary bureaucracy and being told what to do, which I think stems from seeing the worst of corporate culture in a former career, and being self-employed for over 17 years.
Well most recently I’ve found myself in a battle with the local council over their decision to close the entire woods which surround the area where I live. There are a large number of Ash trees in the area which are suffering with something called ‘Ash Die Back’, a fungal disease which will end up killing 80% of the Ash trees in Britain.
It’s a serious problem for sure but the local council’s reaction to discovering it almost 20 years after everyone else, has been the most risk averse health and safety madness I’ve seen for some time.
Instead of sensibly assessing the infected trees and cutting them down, they’ve locked down the entire area like something from a Hollywood post apocalypse film. Most of the interconnecting pathways including some fairly arterial cycle routes have been closed, fenced up while the Land Services department basically spend months in pointless meetings, and writing risk assessments so they can employ ecologists, arborists and eventually tree surgeons to start felling the dead and dying trees.
They are so terrified of someone suing them from being hit by a falling tree that instead of taking a common sense approach and only closing the area when actual tree felling works is being carried out, they have unilaterally decided that walking in woods that are hundreds of years old, is suddenly in 2026 a risk akin to taking a walk near the Chernobyl power station.
Meanwhile, less than 50 yards away there is a gulley that keeps flooding across the main road and has caused several car accidents and near misses over the years. The council have ignored repeatedly calls to repair it along with all the numerous potholes on the surrounding roads, not to mention the frequent fly-tipping.
It’s taken me several weeks of communication to get them to finally admit there have been no actual works being carried on the site for the last 6 weeks, and they haven’t even put the job out to tender to fell the affected trees. In the meantime local residents are being denied access to one of the few green spaces we have to walk dogs, cycle, and generally navigate safer routes to the local town away from the much more life threatening traffic on the neighbouring roads. One disabled resident is stuck in his house because his mobility scooter can’t exit the traffic calming cobbles on the entrance to his road, and his only exit to get anywhere through the footpaths has now been closed.
The lack of joined up thinking is staggering. It’s just an exercise in arse covering…a classic council overreach from over-enthusiastic clipboard fondlers and lanyard autocrats.
I rely on my morning walks with Ozzy for my mental health and sanity. I don’t want to walk with him near main roads and I miss observing the wildlife, the changing of the seasons, and generally being in nature for a short time each morning and evening, something that used to be freely available to me on my doorstep without resorting to driving anywhere.
I’ve lived here for 22 years. Never once has even a twig fallen on me whilst walking in the woods. Plenty has fallen on my studio in that time including very large branches, but that’s because the council have ignored tree maintenance at property boundaries for over 10 years.
Anyway the local residents won’t take it lying down… The fences have been breached, some violently so.. The local dog walkers are a feisty lot, some are well into their 80s and saw national service and rationing and have no time for Clipboard Colin telling them where we can and can’t go in our own parish.
We are doing that British thing of carrying on regardless.
Please arrange bail if you see me on the TV getting arrested and bundled into the back of a police car for throttling a council official.
Power to the people…
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