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Richmond Park : Ham CommonRideLondon litter up 90% in Richmond Park
Litter left by RideLondon 100 riders in Richmond Park is up 90 per cent on last year, according to a local conservation charity, which has reiterated warnings about the lethal effect of litter on deer.
Friends of Richmond Park say they found 182 gel wrappers and opening strips in just 600m of the 100 mile course, 24 hours after July 31 when 27,000 amateur riders and professional cyclists passed through.
Event organisers, who admitted there had been a communication issue with litter patrol teams after this year's event, said they may install cameras on the route next year to identify and ban those who litter.
Chilterns cyclists asked to clean up their act
Friends of Richmond Park trustee, Richard Gray, told Your Local Guardian litter can have serious long-term consequences for deer: “They swallow the plastic and if they eat enough it can stop them digesting other food.
“We’re not anti-cyclist, but we wonder why they have to throw the packets on the floor; why can’t they tuck them into their lycra?
“They blow onto the grass, which make them hard to see for litter-pickers.
“We just don’t want them to get into the deer and preventing them from eating.”
Event director, Hugh Brasher, said next year there will be a dedicated litter clean-up team, who will do one pick after the amateur event, and one after the professional cyclists have passed through.
He told the paper there will be cameras in secret locations throughout the park to catch and ban riders who ignore the event’s anti-littering message.
Mr Brasher said: “We have done an enormous amount of messaging through our #LoveWhereYouRide campaign, which calls on riders to take home any rubbish with them from training rides and to use the waste facilities provided throughout the Prudential Ride London event.
“We have suggested a meeting and dialogue with Friends of Richmond Park.”
#Lovewhereyouride and BIN your litter! https://t.co/UXnuP1kI6Z
— RideLondon (@RideLondon) August 2, 2015
Last year litter pickers found 96 gel wrappers in 600m of the RideLondon course. Of the 100 mile course 6.1km runs through the Park on the outward leg, before heading for the Surrey Hills and back to Central London. The Friends say littering was a problem the year before.
Of course, some participants proudly take their wrappers home with them.
Took all my wrappers home. @RideLondon #proveit #LoveWhereYouRide #RideLondon pic.twitter.com/zZo9yy1c0O
— Steve Castle (@stevecastle) July 31, 2016
Laura Laker is a freelance journalist with more than a decade’s experience covering cycling, walking and wheeling (and other means of transport). Beginning her career with road.cc, Laura has also written for national and specialist titles of all stripes. One part of the popular Streets Ahead podcast, she sometimes appears as a talking head on TV and radio, and in real life at conferences and festivals. She is also the author of Potholes and Pavements: a Bumpy Ride on Britain’s National Cycle Network.
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66 comments
Ah the 'humane' fallacy.
When people conveniently justify killing another species based on their own values.
Well the other non-culling options are:
- Leave the deer to die of starvation and diesese while they strip the park of greenery. A number would also escape the park and be killed on the surrounding roads.
- Introduce a natural predator such as wolves (which would at least cut the numbers of dog walking anti-cycling NIMBYs in the park). Would also make cycling and running in the park more exciting.
No workable alternative solution to culling is availble at the moment.
Even the Bitish Deer Society back culling: http://www.bds.org.uk/index.php/advice-education/why-manage-deer
I think this is the best idea ever, I would be well up for packs of wolves roaming RP.
(I imagine it would also put the wind up the foxes and the rabbits, both of which could do with a culling.)
I've advocated the 'pack of wolves' idea here before. I'm glad you're all coming around to my way of thinking.
Shall we start a petition?
Why is it a fallacy in this case? In the absence of natural predators to control numbers, and a limited space for the deer (the park), would their numbers expand to the point where they were unsustainable through lack of food? Starvation would be a natural method of population control. If that is the alternative then a quick death by bullet does sound more humane.
What would your alternative be? Remove the fences? Relocate the deer to wilder areas (although they are culled elsewhere too)? Bring more food into the park?
Not to mention the cull that happens each year, where they shoot a whole bunch of them to keep the numbers down.
The Friends of Richmond Park are anti-cycling in Richmond Park.
They put out the same crap last year. Using numbers ("90%", "182 gel wrappers") doesn't attach any scientific/statistical merit to what is basically an annual protest at the use of RP for a passtime that the FoRP disapproves of (certainly when engaged in within the Park). Was any attempt made to determine whether any of the gel wrappers had been discarded by participants in Saturday morning's parkrun, which begins just inside the same gate?
I'd like to see RP (and Wimbledon Common and Bushy Park) host a round of the London CX League. It's sufficiently big that you could construct an MTB circuit (with some "red" trail options) without unreasonably affecting other users. The actual chance of this happening is zero, because of people like FoRP. According to the RP Management Statement "The purpose of The Royal Parks is to balance the responsibility to protect, conserve and enhance the unique landscape, environment, ecology, wildlife, heritage and vistas of the eight Royal Parks in London with active and creative policies to encourage wider access to them and to increase opportunities for enjoyment, delight, sanctuary, information, education, creativity and healthy recreation for everyone, now and in the future." (My emphasis.) FoRP (and their ilk) ignore the bit about "balance" (and they aren't interested in being creative) in favour of exclusion.
But people should put their gel wrappers in their pockets and take them home.
GCN recommended a gel 20 minutes in, in one of their videos!
Was it sponsored?
I never touch gels, didn't pick up or eat any during RideLondon last year. Somehow I still seemed to have a collection of half a dozen the next day. Too much crap handed out.
Anyone needing a gel by the time they got to Richmond park needs to train more
No one was a pro, it wasn't a race. Anyone intentionally dropping litter is a selfish, arrogant object. If caught on camera, ban them from entering in the future.
Problem Solved?
http://www.chainreactioncycles.com/high5-gel-flask/rp-prod89836?gs=1&gcl...
So good I posted it twice
Problem Solved?
http://www.chainreactioncycles.com/high5-gel-flask/rp-prod89836?gs=1&gcl...
Don't take gels out any more, too bulky and messy. Pour them into a soft flask before you leave and use that. Makes life way easier.
Got that from Alan Hansen's GCN episode and have been using it since. Best 'why didn't I think of that' moment I've had in ages.
That said, have switched to making my own ow. Basically just use maltodextrin powder with a flavoured electrolyte tablet. Super cheap and have stress tested it up to 125miles at race pace. No solids.
Definitely try it, saves a fortune, cuts out loads of bulk and there's no messy packets to deal with.
I started to use: http://www.wiggle.co.uk/high5-energy-source-plus-22kg/?sku=5360562933
It means that you don't really need to take any gels out with you at all, unless you are doing rides where 1.5l of fluids is going to be used up. When I did RideLondon this year I had a bar at around 50 miles & another at 74 & that was it.
Also a point worth making is that the excellent, regular, feed stations were supplied with the full range of free Clif products. The http://www.clifbar.co.uk/products/clif-shot-gel actually have a "litter leash" which stops the top from being seperated. However the lightbulb produvt for me was the http://www.clifbar.co.uk/products/clif-shot-bloks. They are both easier to eat on the move & if you have a kersey which has one of the small pockets on the side then you can cut the packet into 2 & have then 4 lots stuffed easily in!
Was that the football pundit special?
Whilst it is no excuse for the litter from Ride London but have you seen the mess that smokers leave everywhere. I commute by bike and public transport and the state around many, if not all, entrances to buildings that prohibit smoking inside them is disgraceful and yet it is accepted as part of every day life these days, so regarded as normal behaviour.
The Dutch have a simple solution that makes the disposal of litter fun.
http://www.aviewfromthecyclepath.com/2009/02/rubbish-bins.html
182 out of 27000 - thats less than 1% of entrants littering, there will always be idiots.
Also, there is a high probability that some of the litter was pre-existing, I see gel wrappers after most weekends in RP.
Nope, that's less than 1% littering over a 0.4% long segment of the course. It only represents 1% of the riders if every rider eats a gel during that 600m. Unfortunately the actual percentage littering is going to be far higher
I was out the next day and the road between Leith Hill and Dorking was an absolute disgrace, 1000s if energy gel wrappers.
Tape the tabs to your top tube then you can open with one hand and keep a jersey pocket for empties. I gave all my wrappers to marshals on Ride London, a quick shout, a please and a thank you and they all gladly took them from me as I barrelled past
Regardless of how carefully everyone takes out/puts back gels, bars, bananas etc there's always going to be litter floating out of a back pocket and certainly in a large pack moving at speed no real way of telling where/who it came from. The solution is pretty simple - the organisers put up big catch nets about a mile after each feed stop (on the downwind side!) and request that people simply throw things there.
Worked perfectly on Etape du Tour and on numerous other events in Belgium & France that I've ridden.
Realistically, no-one is going to pull over, stop and carefully place their litter in the nearest bin when riding along in a huge bunch at 30mph, in fact to even try that would be dangerous.
I'd guess that a lot of it comes from the pro race in the afternoon where they DO throw gels and bottles at random and again, no matter how good the post-event clean up, it could be blown half way across that park by then.
If people are stopping at the feed stations to get their gels and using them in the subsequent mile I'm not sure why they can't just neck them there and then?
Fair play, no excuse for dropping litter.
However, I wish the gel manufacturers would develop an opening method which means that the tip remains attached to the main sachet. That's the bit that sometimes gets away by accident.
None whatsoever. Selfish wankers.
If people use gels but don't want an empty wrapper in their overpriced jersey pocket then why don't they take a tiny bag to stuff them in? Charity bags are distributed in pouches that would be ideal or perhaps those poo sacks so many dog owners love to leave behind. Or why not stop at the roadside or feed stop to neck it safely and put the wrapper in a bin? It's not difficult.
Torq have attempted to address this:
http://road.cc/content/news/82278-torq-release-raspberry-ripple-flavour-gel
150 vs 20,000 in the sportive.... ?
Zipvit Zv7 gels are meant to but it doesn't work particularly well.
Shameful behaviour that gives all cyclists a bad name. I saw one cyclist throwing litter on the approach to Box Hill during the ride and gave him a good ear-bashing. These Rapha-clad littering Londoners shouldn't be allowed outside of the M25!
That's a pathetic generalisation...
And no generalisation is wholly true, including this one.
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