I've Warned The Brecon Beacons National Park... Again...
Email to the Director of Nature Recovery and Climate Change at the Brecon Beacons National Park
Thank you for your response. It was lengthy and detailed but it failed to answer the lack of action, or rather the inaction, following my email of September 2022. No worries, I didn't really expect that to be answered.
To date the area remains chaotic and I will be monitoring on my visits there over the next few weeks. It's good news that signage is being replaced, we'll just have to see what with.
You haven't grasped the key issue, and that is one of a continuous journey. This is what people want. This is what people seek. The closure of the path means that many will seek to continue, either on the closed path or along the river or by any other means than retracing their steps. Just because you don't want them to doesn't mean they won't. I see many seeking to continue upstream, climbing up the steep wooded hillsides etc.
And this is the key issue, your staff and other managers of the location do not see the area from a visitors perspective.
If you were a German National Park, for instance, instead of closing the path you would have either made it safe without too much effort, a bit of digging into the bank and making good, or, would have made a feature of this part of the trail by putting in a walkway. But then Wales is not Germany, I'm sad to say.
Finally, just because it's the law sometimes doesn't mean it must be done. Common sense surely is important? Making a path crossing a river above a waterfall known to those who would otherwise be oblivious to it as a public access route has to be regarded as careless at the least.
Individuals and groups who want to walk a natural circular trail but are unable to, due to the path closure, and who will therefore seek out alternative and even less safe routes, will be at risk. This is avoidable and I've been asking that something be done about this since May 2022. I therefore reiterate my assertion that this area will be the location of incidents, accidents and there is a strong possibility of further deaths.
Here is the background to this matter detailed in a previous blog post.
And this is the email that my response above refers to, received March 16th, a full two months following my follow up complaint and a full six months from my first warning:
Dear Mr Lamb
Thank you for your patience in awaiting my response to the concerns raised in your email of 31st January 2023, as I am sure you can imagine there are several landowners and partners involved within the Waterfall Country Area. So there have been various meetings and discussions which it was useful to hold before I responded to your questions and consulting with them all has delayed my response to you.
As part of our ongoing commitment to managing Waterfalls Country with partners, the NPA has received four years of funding from Welsh Government to review the infrastructure of the area, and in the first year of funding a review of paths and signage was commissioned. The report was received in financial year 2022-23, and this has been the basis for works during this financial year and will guide works in the next two financial years.
In tandem with these works, traffic management around the area is ongoing, building with partners short term actions, yellow lines, traffic infringement enforcement, etc. as well as longer term solutions. Our Warden and Community Team works with local car park providers to encourage sign up to the NPA Ambassador Scheme and give out messages in tune with those from NPA staff in the more formal car parks.
In addition, NRW and NPA staff are frequently in the area walking trails and talking to visitors.
We have reviewed the signage internally and with partners and landowners. Updated diversion signage and route signage is in the processes of being installed which should be clearer and more visible. We are also collaborating with partners to develop a longer-term approach to our signage and messaging to ensure that it is clear and consistent across the whole area to avoid any confusion that changes of signs/information used by different landowners could cause.
We are working with our Communications teams and those of our partners to increase visitor safety messaging and promote the message ‘to be prepared, undertake an individual risk assessment, and understand your route and the risks that may be presented’. We also try to encourage people to park at the two main car parks where we can provide greater information, warden/meet and greet staff to welcome and give advice (in response to your point about warden visibility we do prioritise the main car parks as this is where we encourage most visitors to park in order that we can reduce the disruption to the local community from people parking elsewhere or in the villages). We pay for additional meet and greet staff during the busy periods, but this relies on us securing additional funds which are not always available.
We recognise the right a need to make the promoted routes as prominent and accessible as possible and to reduce the risk of people straying onto the less accessible paths and we are taking measures to ameliorate this through new signage and the implementation of changes to several routes. We are in the process of replacing our finger posts with larger and colour coded signage.
I also note your comments about visitor feedback and undertaking a visitor survey, we do track the walking group/tourism web and social media sites and my experience is that the majority of people comment on how well signed the main routes are, how easy the maps and signposts are to follow etc…but we do learn from all feedback.
We also undertake an Annual visitor survey and intend to have some additional surveys planned for this year and our team will be there to talk to users and get feedback – so hopefully with all this information we can keep developing our ideas and improving the visitor experience.
I did follow up on your comment that the diversion sent people across the river above the waterfall and I don’t believe what you have said is correct.
The diversion in place, clearly shows that the route is closed and the signage advises people to return back to the main designated path shown on maps as the Red Route, it does not signpost people across the route above the falls. However, it is unfortunate that when closing a footpath, the public notice that we are obliged to show does include all the rights of way in the area which would include this route. But we have visited the sites again to increase and enlarge the diversion signage so that it is even more obvious which path is closed and which to follow, we have also added more signs along the diverted route so people find it easy to stay on it.
With regards to the path closure, having liaised with the landowner NRW, it was considered appropriate to close the public footpath.
Your final point is made with regards to the various other user groups, and it is a shame that for the various reasons you do not wish to work with them. We try to seek input from as many users as possible and welcome feedback from all our visitors.
Thank you for taking the time to feedback and comment. As I have said the works described above are part of a longer programme of work and I hope that over the spring and summer we can also engage with our visitors and continue our learning and improvement.
In the event that your concerns have not been resolved, you may make a formal complaint using the Authority’s complaints procedure. I have attached a link to the policy and forms for convenience: Complaints, Compliments and feedback | Brecon Beacons National Park Authority (beacons-npa.gov.uk)
