Friday, April 26 - Hidden Paths

[Greg F]

Julie, it’s probably fair to remind you the wingmen you’ve got here.

This was Alan and Jon’s last act of rebellion and protest:

[Mikael]

[mfarnham]

The censor monkeys are restless, and I'm having to give each of them individual spa treatments (combs and all) to calm them down. Curse you Alan.

I would just remind folks that it's worth getting full information before drawing conclusions, and that polite conversations are usually more effective than torches and lingerie. Was this ever a public path? Is it just a Hydro right of way (in which case the general public may not be entitled to access)? And if it is meant to be public, are the current landowners even the ones who "took it over"? In many cases, the right of way may have been encroached upon decades ago, by previous owners. New owners may not be fully aware of the status of that right of way, or they may have seen what their neighbour did and assumed it was abandoned. It's probably what I would have done if I weren't always looking for these types of trails to explore.

Martin

[Alan]

This has nothing to do with recovering these hidden paths but is the kind of thing I would do to Johnny Fyfe if we worked together.

[Julie]

Old and new hidden (the uplands park access looks like driveways). I questioned my memory yesterday when I tried to go through both those entrance points, since (at both people) were in their driveway, but it’s NOT their driveways.....its access road to uplands park

Martin. I checked with the municipality of oak bay. It’s NOT for any utilities (even if it was an access point how would they get through the fences?)
I’m aware that some of the owners might not check their property lines when they purchase real estate (my mom bought land, some of which her neighbour had build on (thinking it was their property line or expanding their property line?)

It’s a great location for a path and would be great to have an escape route off beach, right to uplands park no less. It’s depriving the community of blissful walks, runs, rides.

[schouten]

I totally buy into walkable cities with lots of greenways and access routes! It would be so nice to have these reopened.

[LouiseF]

Kind of off topic, kind of on topic but this morning I was walking my kids to school using one of these such passage-ways in my neighborhood. We walk up my neighbor's driveway (feels kind of awkward) but at the end there is a clear pass-through where there used to be a fence but when the new owners bought the house they put a hole in it so the Dad had quicker access to the bus stop on Ferndale, thereby opening it up for all of us. Once on the other side of the fence there is a well worn single track path that goes along the side of another house (with a private property sign hammered to a tree) and then a gravel alley leads to Ferndale. This saves 10 minutes on our walk to school which otherwise would be about 25 minutes.

This morning we were greeted with a whole lot of dry brush that had been cut off a big tree, completely blocking the pathway. I'm going to give the owners of the house with the private property sign the benefit of the doubt that they were doing yard work and hadn't yet gotten around to clearing the brush cut from the tree. But I am also thinking that maybe someone is not liking people walking beside their property and using this pathway. Might be time for a call to Saanich.

So it's not just in Oak Bay where people are blocking public right of ways (and where new owners open them up).

[JTyre]

Thank you, Julie, for checking on whether these (former) paths are for utilities or not. I will also say, that I am highly skeptical of the notion that owners do not know where their property lines are, and blindly plant trees, build fences, dump refuse, and maintain roads where they should not. It also doesn't matter to me, nor would it to the municipality (I presume) that these impediments were those of former residents or not.

For all we know, the current residents are community-minded and open to thoughtful argument (if not torches and lingerie). Martin, have you found out anything yet from the folks that you know?

[Rolf]

Spotter's badge to Ann P.: https://www.oakbaynews.com/news/cyclist ... lmSfILZz04 Yes, we were Shocked... Shocked... to find our "zigging" through Oak Bay was impeded.

Way to raise visibility and profile of the issue, Julie! (And 4th at Ironman Canada? )

If any of you may have inadvertently cursed in one of your posts on this now very public thread (even if in a foreign language), or countenanced vigilantism, maybe now is the time to self-censor...