Are there any legal lanes you can ride off road in the UK?

Trail Riders Fellowship (TRF) - https://www.trf.org.uk/ Green Lane Association - https://glass-uk.org/ Trans European Trail (TET) - https://transeurotrail.org/ Can you ride or drive off-road in the UK? In this video I’ll attempt to answer this question. I say attempt because there’s not a simple, straightforward answer. The fact that it’s so complicated is part of the problem. Unless you’re an expert on rights of way, definitive maps and ancient byways you can easily find yourself somewhere you shouldn’t be. This is frustrating for people who just want to enjoy the pleasures of taking a motor vehicle off road. The issue is so contentious that I feel the need to say I am not an expert and this is not legal advice. It’s a personal perspective on the matter, take it or leave it but please don’t try to use it to justify your adventures off road. Green Lanes or Green Roads are legal unsurfaced tracks that you can drive on so long as your vehicle is fully legal to drive on normal roads, taxed, insured, MOT’d and in a safe condition. You need to have a driving licence for the bike you’re riding as well. In the UK we have Motorwyas, A Roads, B Roads and unclassified roads. Prior to 1950 green lanes were included with the unclassified roads and there were lots of them. We’ll call them UCR’s. After 1950 things started to get complicated and it’s only got worse since then. Road used as Public Path or RUPP was introduced. Many of the UCR green lanes became RUPPS. RUPPS took on the status of a ‘right of way’. This sounds great you may say - it’s now a right of way. But if you stop and think about it for a while, this is like someone declaring control of your motorcycle and given you the right to use it. Before this these lanes were simply there for our use. RUPPS joined Footpaths and Bridleways as ‘rights of way’ and supported by what is called the ‘definitive map’ controlled by the local council. In about 1970, to confuse matters more, Byways Open to all Traffic or BOATS were introduced. If you take a look at either a Landranger or Explorer Ordnance Survey Map you’ll find these ‘rights of way’ along with a disclaimer absolving OS from any mistakes they or you may make. Basically, back when I started in 1986 you were pretty safe if you kept to the RUPPS and BOATS. Unfortunately, those days were not to last. The government introduced legislation and policies to allow local authorities to review rights of way and RUPPS were either reclassified as ‘Byways Open to all Traffic’ (BOATS) or ‘Restricted Byways’. Restricted byway is a confusing term. Restricted doesn’t mean a byway with restrictions, it means no motor vehicles at all! This makes the signage ambiguous. Imagine a ‘restricted footpath or bridleway’ that’s never open to walkers or horses. The restricted byway gave the power to councils to exclude motor vehicles from hundreds of miles of previously open greenlanes. I don’t know the exact percentage of rights of way that were RUPPS but it was tiny in comparison with footpaths and bridleways, at best I would say just 5%. Given the Ramblers could walk the bridleways as well, this gave them virtually exclusive use of the vast majority of rights of way. These ancient byways, which had existed for hundreds and in some cases thousands of years, were literally wiped of the map, at least as far as motor vehicles were concerned. Thankfully, the TRF did what they could and along with resistance from other organisations, some locals and fair minded parishes and councils many were reclassified as BOATS. So, you told all of this when you could have simply said get an Ordnance Survey Map and stick to the BOATS I hear you say. I think that’s what the government would like but you’d be missing out. Let’s just say it’s complicated. Those UCR’s I spoke about earlier haven’t gone away and to make it even more confusing, there’s even something called ORPA - Other Route with public Access! The bottom line is they’ve made it very difficult to know if it’s a green lane or not. Even the signage cannot be relied upon. From experience, locals are unlikely to be very helpful either. Here’s your options - 1. Grab that OS map and stick to the BOATS. 2. Find a local rider that knows the lanes and even take you on a guided ride. 3. Join and ride with the TRF. 4. Subscribe to the TRF or GLASS (Green Lane Association) to access their maps. The TRF say basic access is available without subscription but when I tried I couldn’t get in. 5. Finally, there’s the Trans European Trail or TET. This is not a map of all UK green lanes but has threaded together a route that is mainly small tarmac lanes but also includes a lot of green lanes. It’s free. #Trail Riders Fellowship #TRF #Trail #Trans Euopean Trail #TET @trailridersfellowship8717 @GreenLaneAssociation Bikes featured - 2019 Honda VFR1200X Crosstourer 1998 Honda XLR125R 1984 Honda XL250R 1982 Suzuki TS250ER