-------------------------------------------------- We the undersigned petition the Prime Minister to suspend Section 6 of the Natural Environment and Rural Communities Act 2006 to allow "byways open to all traffic" to be established where motor vehicle rights of way existed prior to 2006.
This section of the act extinguished motor vehicle rights from "restricted byways". The effect has been to close half the rights of way previously open to motor vehicles.
Motor vehicles may now only use "byways open to all traffic", only 2% of all rights of way. Many of these are effectively closed to motor vehicles as they are classed as restricted byways for part their length. Motor vehicles, therefore, can use substantially less than the
4,500km of rights of way quoted by the government.Rather than reduce the potential for conflict of use, noise nuisance or damage, the act may have the opposite effect as it concentrates recreational vehicle use on a smaller number of rights of way.
Early commencement of the legislation has left many rights of way incorrectly recorded and led to the loss of motor vehicle rights over many historic routes. Suspending Section 6 would allow highways authorities, user groups and individuals to apply to reclassify these as "byways open to all traffic", ensuring that their status is correctly recorded
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