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Barbed wire strung across Malvern Hills cycling trails

Charity that manages Worcestershire beauty spot “gravely concerned” over find

Malvern Hills Trust says that it is “gravely concerned” over the discovery of barbed wire strung across cycling trails at the Worcestershire beauty spot.

The charity, which manages the Malvern Hills and Commons, says that police alerted it to the traps yesterday morning.

“A warden attended the site and removed two sections of wire that had been placed across trails on the hills in the woods near to Holywell,” the trust said in a statement published on its website.

“We are gravely concerned to see the wire strung across the trails, but are relieved that no one was injured by them,” the statement continued.

“It is never acceptable for individuals to go out and place barbed wire like this across any path, route, track or trail on the hills due to the risk of causing injury or damage. 

“Such behaviour puts anyone who comes to the hills for exercise or for recreation, including cyclists, walkers, joggers and horse riders, at risk of injury.

“The trust seriously condemns this dangerous behaviour and asks that anyone who witnesses the erection of unofficial barriers or finds wire obstacles such as this to report them to the police and also to the trust who will remove them,” it added.

We have regularly had occasion over the years to report on barbed wire, planks of wood studded with nails and similar traps being placed on routes used by cyclists, but it was noticeable that there were more reports of them than usual during the initial lockdown last year.

> Cyclist injured by wire stretched across West Yorkshire trail

Despite their potential to cause serious injury or worse, the idea of setting such traps does seem to appeal to certain newspaper columnists when writing anti-cyclist pieces.

Last year, Sunday Times columnist Rod Liddle wrote that he found it “tempting” to “tie piano wire at neck height across the road” to target cyclists – although the Independent Press Standards Organisation said in response to complaints that the article did not infringe the Editors’ Code of Practice.

> Press watchdog rejects complaints over Rod Liddle “piano wire” column

The newspaper itself defended the column, saying that it “was not meant to be taken seriously” – the precise phrase that the charity Cycling UK said, when it lodged a complaint, would be an “inappropriate” defence of it. 

Simon joined road.cc as news editor in 2009 and is now the site’s community editor, acting as a link between the team producing the content and our readers. A law and languages graduate, published translator and former retail analyst, he has reported on issues as diverse as cycling-related court cases, anti-doping investigations, the latest developments in the bike industry and the sport’s biggest races. Now back in London full-time after 15 years living in Oxford and Cambridge, he loves cycling along the Thames but misses having his former riding buddy, Elodie the miniature schnauzer, in the basket in front of him.

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7 comments

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eburtthebike | 3 years ago
8 likes

Rod Liddle wasn't the first, Matthew Parris suggested exactly the same idea of putting piano wire at head height on cycle paths years before Liddle, and then "apologised" by saying it was a joke and he was sorry cyclists didn't have a sense of humour.

Definitely time cycle hate was a crime.

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Secret_squirrel replied to eburtthebike | 3 years ago
3 likes

Bear in mind they are part of the same group of mainstream newspapers & journalists who believe they don't have a racism problem either.  
In fact they appear to believe it's their god given right to say anything that's not actually provably illegal to sell newspapers.  As a result they will bait any 'Other' they come across.

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WeLoveHills replied to Secret_squirrel | 3 years ago
2 likes

Exactly. But, in addition, the piano wire "joke" is acceptable because the assumption is that most people would naturally agree: cyclists are a nuisance. It's seen as entirely non-controversial. No journalist (I hope) would make a similar "joke" about an ethnic group, for example.

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Milkfloat | 3 years ago
3 likes

So the police had it reported to them and their response was not to investigate but to just pass it on?

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Jenova20 replied to Milkfloat | 3 years ago
1 like

Milkfloat wrote:

So the police had it reported to them and their response was not to investigate but to just pass it on?

 

You didn't really expect them to do their job properly did you?

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Bungle73 replied to Milkfloat | 3 years ago
0 likes

Investigate by doing what? With what evidence? And how do you know what they did and didn't do?

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AlsoSomniloquism replied to Bungle73 | 3 years ago
1 like

The below is telling us what they did do:-

Quote:

We were made aware on Monday morning (8th March) by the police that an unknown person(s) had placed barbed wire by across routes on the Malvern Hills.  A warden attended the site and removed two sections of wire that had been placed across trails on the Hills in the woods near to Holywell.

Granted they have since stated that they are increasing foot and cycle patrols along the paths. 

https://www.worcesternews.co.uk/news/19149427.police-patrols-stepped-mal...

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