It’s the brainchild of two of freeride mountain biking’s most respected figures, hosted one of the sport’s most popular events, and been variously described as the “backyard of dreams”, a “dirt masterpiece” and a “Garden of Eden”.
But a mountain bike track nestled in the Welsh countryside has been deemed illegal by planners this week after it was built without permission, with councillors criticising the track for “scarring the countryside”.
The compound, located at Maes Loonskie, Cwm Nant-y-Meichiaid, in the countryside between Llanfyllin and Meifod in central Wales, was built by Vero Sandler and Sam Hodgson.
New Zealand-born Sandler is regarded as one of the pioneers of freeride mountain biking, an exciting off-road discipline that sees riders earn points for performing gravity-defying tricks, instead of racing each other.
The jumps and ramps they built in the garden of their rural property have played host in 2024 and 2025 to a round of Backyard Battle, a series featuring some of the world’s best freeriders and sponsored by the Monster Energy drinks company.
In a video posted last month on YouTube by Ghost Bikes, Hodgson discussed how the track was built and developed over the past few years.
“It’s literally in my bones to just build stuff and ride it,” Hodgson, originally from the Isle of Wight, said. “I had the canvas but nothing to ride, so I had to build it.”
However, that building work came under scrutiny during a meeting of Powys County Council’s planning committee on Thursday, where councillors received a “part retrospective” proposal to construct the bike track, including the siting of two containers, the construction of new access, and associated works at the compound.
After 20 objections were made against the application, senior planning officer Kate Bowen recommended that councillors refuse permission, claiming the track has had a negative impact on a group of listed buildings 150 metres away, the County Times reports.
Bowen also claimed that the compound creates an “alien topography which is at stark contrast to the existing landscape”.
During the meeting, Hodgson and Sandler were also criticised for going ahead with the construction of the track before they had received planning permission.
“I’m absolutely baffled why anybody embarking on a development of this scale would not have consulted with the local community, assessed the ecology of the area, and address access issues,” Conservative councillor Jonathan Wilkinson said.
“I first became of aware of this about two years ago when residents reported huge amounts of earth being moved on a steep side near their properties serviced by a single-track C road.”
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According to the documents submitted as part of the planning process, the bike track was listed as being for private use only, something criticised by the councillors who noted the “significant” traffic using the site and its hosting of the Backyard Battle series.
“I know lots of people would be excited by this development and biking is a growth industry,” Liberal Democrat councillor Angela Davies said.
“But I just cannot get my head around what the developers were thinking that this was okay to do this without planning permission.
“There’s a lot of videos around. The Backyard Battle event was held at this site in June 2025 with music and dancing. That was a big event – so I think it’s disingenuous to say this is for personal use.”
Meanwhile, Plaid Cymru’s Elwyn Vaughan told the meeting that photographs shown to the committee revealed that the track had led to a “scarring of the countryside”.
“We need to send a message this is not acceptable,” he said, arguing that it was “not right” that developers build first and then expect the council to “bend over”.
Wilkinson also added that there are “dwellings” on site, at least one of which is “occupied”, telling the meeting: “I would have liked to see an application include those dwellings as we’re almost pretending they don’t exist.”
However, planning agent Oliver Evans told the committee that Hodgson and Sandler had a “clear willingness to make meaningful adjustments to the track layout in order to reduce visual impact and respond to concerns raised”.
He also pointed out that planning policy stressed the need to support sustainable economic development in rural areas.
Nevertheless, the members of the committee voted unanimously to refuse the application, the chairperson Gareth Jones concluding: “We want to send a clear message that we won’t stand for this.”
road.cc has contacted Sam Hodgson for comment on the decision.
16 thoughts on ““Backyard of dreams” mountain bike track built without planning permission deemed illegal, as councillors claim site has “scarred countryside””
Indeed, what a pair of entitled……
One thing to build yourself a track, but a venue?
…and I suppose the adjacent monocrop fields have been like that for time immorial, and are perfectly natural? What good fortune for the farmers that own the land!
Oh wait.
And your point is?
The farmers land would have be zoned as agricultural land at some point, and they still have to get permission if they want to do something different.
My point is that anyone that considers it an eyesore because it’s “unnatural” should realise that farm land is not natural either, other than the fact that it’s green
It looks bloody awful and planning regs were deliberately ignored.
I can just imagine the condemnation on this website if an SUV offroading course had been built.
Surely we should approve of an SUV offroading course, get them back in their natural habitat rather than on the city streets?
Fair point🙂
RE: “get [SUVs] back in their natural habitat rather than on the city streets?”
Needs a multi-generational rewilding effort – quite a few I’ve seen are even nervous about getting their tyres dirty on the streets as I found them on the footways!
Maybe we could get David Attenborough onto it?
Looks like an opencast mine!
I thought it was a bit rough when Essex council told Sam Pilgrim to remove the couple of small-ish ramps in his back garden. But this is on another level.
Big enough to be easy to find on google maps. Here’s a streetview shot
https://maps.app.goo.gl/G4uT6QWL72yAmktaA
… got curious and readily found an asphalt company about 10km east of the MTB track … easily 4x the land scar. For sure they got a permit for that.
So, it seems to me the council is being punitive due to lack of permitting before building. If they allowed some kind of asphalt strip mine, they would have allowed an MTB track. I would say they should go through the permitting process with clarity about usage rules with changes to the site to make it less impactful to the land and impose a fine due to all the extra hours expended discussing it with the full council (which is what the permitting process and rules are meant to avoid).
No the Council is not being punitive due to lack of planning before building.
These people lied and said it was private use only – not true.
There’s a dwelling used on site without permission.
No ecological assesment.
Generates large volumes of traffic.
The list of wrongs is massive.
We can’t just go and dig up the countryside because we think it’s cool to build a bike track.
Sone people like Bike Park Wales and other places literally spend years and £10s of thousands getting planning right before doing anything. (As far as I know)
Ignoring all the other points made by others about how they lied on their planning application, the local council may have looked more kindly on it if they were tying to open a track for the public to use, at least that way there could be some local jobs attached to it , like there probably is with the industrial activity you highlighted.
As it stands, there’s nothing but a scar on the landscape and a load of noise for the locals.
Literally got sponsors logos on it ffs.
Pair of weapons.
Just a brief technical point. Based on the story and reading of the committee meeting report and the application (25/0867/FUL), the mountain bike track is not “illegal”, as the headline states.
I haven’t established if shortcuts with habitat/ecological duties or other responsibilities might amount to offences, but as a planning matter (which is the consideration it was given at the Planning, Taxi Licensing and Rights of Way Committee, 12th March), it has been refused permission.
The application was retrospective, which means it was applying for permission for development already carried out. This is not desirable, but it is not uncommon. A decision-maker is required to give consideration to the merits of the application before them, not whether the applicant has jumped the gun or not (that works both ways – you shouldn’t get undue ‘forgiveness’, but neither should you be ‘punished’).
The status, as publicly available, is that the development is a breach of planning control. This is explicitly not an offence.
I presume that the application was the result of informal enforcement action. Informal negotiation is the appropriate approach, in accordance with government guidance. The purpose is to regularise development, whether through making it ‘good’ and in line with policy (whether permission is required or permitted development applies), or reinstating the original condition of the land. Failing that, formal enforcement may commence. That – I imagine – is what will now follow…
An Enforcement Notice would be served, setting out what is wrong, what needs to be done and by when. There are appeal processes, based on various grounds (essentially, has the notice been properly served, is the allegation true, is the remedy fair and proportionate, and does it allow reasonable time to do something). After a qualifying period, the notice becomes effective and the work required has to be done by the date stated.
Failure to comply with the Enforcement Notice is the first Planning-related offence that can be tested in court.
Depending on what conversations are being held behind the scenes (in the appropriate spirit of informal resolution), it’s possible an amendment to the application might be considered, but given the horror expressed by members, I would imagine that the enforcement team will even now be chasing their draft notice through Legal and serving it toute de suite.