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Controversy Over Irish Walking Paths
The government joins in an effort to keep "unofficial" walking paths open
for tourists.
Walking across a farm field to get to a beach, a hilltop or an old
monument used to be no big deal in Ireland. But nowadays, a controversy
is brewing over public access to private lands, pitting farmers and
other private landowners against hikers who want to keep their right to
roam the famous green fields on self-guided Ireland walking tours.
For 10 years, a privately funded group known as "Keep Ireland Open"
(KIO) has tried to find a solution that will give tourists, and a lot
of Irish people as well, continued access to thousands of "unofficial"
walking paths that have crisscrossed the countryside for years. Dublin
native Roger Garland is the Chairman of KIO (he was also the first
Green Party TD elected in Ireland in the 1980's). He says the group's
efforts are now getting a helping hand from the Irish Government, which
has set up a "Countryside Council" to try and create a national network
of public walking paths, recorded on maps and marked on the ground. The
government is, according to Garland, "gradually goading local
authorities" into helping the effort. It's a slow and expensive
process, since about half of the "rights of way" proposed are met with
legal challenges from landowners.
Screaming Farmers
Only rarely have farmers come out and yelled at people to get off their
lands. But according to Garland, "for tourism, one bad incident is one
too many." The problem, he says, differs from county to county. "At
some locations in Wicklow (near Dublin), up to 1,000 people, mostly
Irish, might pass a particular point in the countryside on a weekend
day. In Kerry or Donegal, you might have only 50 or 100 in a day,
mainly Europeans." Oddly enough, he says, landowners in Kerry or
Donegal often get more upset about the hikers, because they've only
appeared in the past 25 years or so. In Wicklow, hikers have appeared
by the thousands every weekend for as long as anyone can remember.
"Keep Ireland Open' isn't a perfect name for our group," Garland says,
"because Ireland today isn't really open - it's only half-open."
Getting a national map of walkways will be worth the long effort, he
feels, "because once it's done, it's done for all time."
For more info, visit www.keepirelandopen.org
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