Look what's appeared.
A new, legible notice telling everyone other than mountain bike riders to sod off and go somewhere else.
I hadn't seen it, but a couple drew it to my attention this morning saying that they had been banned from walking in the Jubilee Woods.
I said 'What!'
They explained that they had been walking through those woods for years until the construction of the Fantastic Mountain Bike Trail started. It has, so they say, (I haven't seen all of it myself) taken over practically the whole of the woods, and the previous pathways, worn by generations of feet, are either, now, part of it, or are inaccessible because of it.
The notice from Sandwell confirms what they thought, from their own observations, that they, like most everyone else, are personae non grata in Jubilee Woods!!
This is a classic example of Sandwell 'looking after the countryside' (I quote from one of its own notices) - a civic attribute to which Sandwell has awarded itself on more than one occasion. Unfortunately, not many people will be seeing how well Sandwell will be looking after this particular bit of countryside from this point onwards.
But what are we to make of the new; shiny; jumbo-sized notice?
Why is it that, barely 2 weeks after the Fantastic Mountain Bike Trail seemed to be finished, complete with little signs on stumps, Sandwell has now put up a much bigger, albeit temporary, laminated version, which reads exactly as the original?
Has something rattled Sandwell's cage?
Has a non-mountain bike rider already been injured, and I missed it?
Has Sandwell become alert to the possibility, nay, likelihood, of something nasty happening in the Jubilee Woods?
Does Sandwell think that by putting up a legible version of the smaller 'everyone keep out' version, it will save itself a few bob when the claims start coming in?
Watch this space .................
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