there's a venue in Yorkshire where you have to text or ring the landowner to ask for permission to visit on a specific time / day...it seems to work. And doesn't require any website build etc. Appreciate that will involve additional admin effort on Jim's part though, unless someone else volunteered?
Sorry. But there’s a strong sense of privilege coming through. We, as a collective climbers that goes beyond UKB, have taken liberties and felt entitled to do what we wanted. Inspite of very reasonable expectations and efforts of the landowner to support climbing, climbers have now faced the accountability of their actions. You can suggest all the different apps, social media ideas, and BMC should do this & that. but ultimately it’s the behaviour and mindsets of climbers that need to change. There’s loads of other examples like Raven Tor parking as noted last week, the ongoing issues at Griffs. These venues are not where beginners go, it’s climbers who know better. The idea of ringing up and booking a spot with the landowner, imo, reflects this entitled mindset. Why should he allocate time to meet the needs of climbers and take phone calls. He has his own life to live and what if he’s not there? Is he responsible to set up a contingency plan?? Sadly, this is the lesson that needs to be learnt. I’m gutted I can’t climb there anymore, but Jim has been very patient & accommodating. But we as climbers blew it. Other spots will go if mentalities & behaviours don’t change.
If people can ignore a sign they can definitely ignore a WhatsApp group or an app.
Agree it wouldn't totally solve the problem but I think would make it less likely to occur. Nobody needs to administrate it should be pretty simple to automate.Could also give a way to monitor what's going on up there as you now have email/phone contacts for those attending and could survey if the rules users observed the rules being followed while there
Sure this would work if there was 20 climbers in the UK. Good luck getting a thousand people to sign up and use an app/group chat/tech solution.
Quote from: Dingdong on May 15, 2023, 12:52:54 pmSure this would work if there was 20 climbers in the UK. Good luck getting a thousand people to sign up and use an app/group chat/tech solution.I don't think it needs to be as big a barrier as you think it is. All you need is:1) A very visible, well worded sign at the entrance and at the car park explaining the situation and including a link and a QR code for the site. It also needs to spell out in clear words what the consequences of non-compliance are.2) A super basic website. Sign up with a full name and email address.3) A basic page with with 6 slots available for each am/pm slot or however you want to break down the slots. I think 3 hour windows could work well. If you wanted to be fancy, the slots could adjust with daylight hours so they were shorter in the winter.4) If you wanted to get really fancy, the sign could include a QR code to sign in and out of your slot so that your slot can be freed up if you leave early. Repeated no shows could get you blocked from booking a slot for a few weeks to stop people taking the mick.5) Very visible wording and links to the website from the UKC and RAD pages*.We all managed to do similar to go visit a wall during covid. To be successful, I think it would need to done via a website that doesn't need an app, or via RGPro (because it already has all of the functionality we would need and because I expect most climbers had to create an account on there during covid anyway).For the tool to be successful, I think it would need to fall to the climbing community to set it up and manage it (probably via the BMC, not that there should need to be any managing to do once it's set up) and for us to then go to the landowner and propose it as a solution that could allow access to continue while minimising the chance of anyone breaking the access rules.I agree that whatsapp is a non-starter. Too many people don't have whatsapp and people aren't going to want to join a group chat with hundreds of other people potentially sending them messages.* At the risk of going off on a tangent, I think UKC logbook pages and the RAD could be a lot clearer when it comes to crags with sensitive access. The access issues aren't prominent enough or easy enough to navigate to, the wording is too often ambiguous or out of date, and UKC/RAD often contradict each other.
Honestly the simplest solution is just ensuring that you and your friends all post regular access updates to social media accounts, specifically Instagram as that’s what most punters use. It would also be very useful if the better known climbers all shared this information but even they don’t bother and then complain when access gets withdrawn. You’re not gonna get people to sign up to a website or app or group chat. You need to disseminate information where the majority of people browse climbing content: Instagram and YouTube. The problem is that 80% of the people on this forum are stuck in 2002 and think posting on Instagram is lame.Like Remus says, majority of people are just casual punters and may not know/care about access issues as climbing isn’t their entire lives like everyone on here.
Honestly the simplest solution is just ensuring that you and your friends all post regular access updates to social media accounts, specifically Instagram as that’s what most punters use. It would also be very useful if the better known climbers all shared this information but even they don’t bother and then complain when access gets withdrawn. You’re not gonna get people to sign up to a website or app or group chat. You need to disseminate information where the majority of people browse climbing content: Instagram and YouTube. The problem is that 80% of the people on this forum are stuck in 2002 and think posting on Instagram is lame.
Sorry if it came off as an aggravating rant and insulting but it’s kind of at the point where this discussion has been had numerous times without any real resolution? Just a bit frustrating at how slow the mechanisms move.Why is it that Jim has now banned access (rightly so may I add) but I haven’t seen either the UKC/RAD updated? Neither have I seen any singular posts from the BMC channels notifying people of access changes, could see people turning up this weekend and climbing on the rocks not realising the ban is already in place, further jeopardising access there in the future.