Legislation has mandated the England Coast Path, which in other regions may provide useful alternative recreation, pleasant views and tourist destinations. For the New Forest it will invite more disturbance into our most precious coastal habitats, a nearly uninterrupted series of highly designated and protected zones of international importance.
There is no funding for mitigation and little regard for infrastructure; some stretches, near or on small country lanes in the most remote parts of our coast, precisely where we wouldn’t want to exacerbate the verge parking problem.
The Ordnance Survey will show the entire “coastal margin” (the entire seaward side of the path) as “access land”, without delineating exclusions. As the route is likely to be significantly inland and much of our coast will be excluded for habitat protections, this depiction will be grotesquely inaccurate. Arguments will be had with visitors assured by the allegedly definitive map that they (and their pets) may trespass on bird nesting grounds regardless of what the signs say. The Ordnance Survey should restrict their illustration to the route of the path itself, and only show coastal access land as it unambiguously exists now at Calshot, Lepe Country Park and other similar extant areas.
Unfortunately these problems will be pertinent wherever it may be proposed, and we expect the consultation on the Lymington to Calshot route from Natural England later this month. We hope the Verderers will help press the case with the Ordnance Survey and will resist the worst excesses of this arbitrary unnecessary exercise which will bring not a jot of benefit to the Forest.
[Note: this is the graphic that may appear on some of the OS maps. There are weak provisos that the OS will claim covers the issue. These do not even mention exclusions for habitat protection. There is no guarantee that this language will even be included on all relevant OS maps, nor that they will be featured at any remarkable scale for legibility.
Excluded areas will be the majority of the margin along our coast, and should either be shown accurately, or not shown as access land at all.
Natural England have the unhappy task of negotiating the route, and they and the National Park Authority will be responsible for signage and maintenance of any physical barriers to nominally protect the route.
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