[Talk-GB] Advice please: Goat tracks in mountain areas

[Mark Goodge]

On 06/02/2022 20:32, nathan case wrote:
> Looking at the Strava Heatmap, there’s pretty good “heat” for that 
> route. It’s definitely not as strong as the paths to the north and south 
> of it, but it is certainly there. This indicates that more than just the 
> occasional walker has used it (considering only a fraction of walkers 
> would upload their data to Strava).
> 
> https://www.strava.com/heatmap#16.00/-4.07493/53.07432/hot/all 
> <https://www.strava.com/heatmap#16.00/-4.07493/53.07432/hot/all> (you’d 
> need to log in for high resolution)
> 
> Now I’m not sure how Strava builds up the Heatmap, i.e. how often it is 
> refreshed/updated or how many users over what time period this level of 
> heat relates to, but it does appear this route is in use.
> 
> In which case, is it actually a path by virtue of use?

It's in an open access area, so people can, and some do, go anywhere. I 
don't think we should map something just because enough people have used 
this particular route for it to show on Strava. Otherwise, over time, 
almost any open access area is going to be criss-crossed with so many 
paths that it becomes almost meaningless.

What it really needs, of course, is for someone to survey it on the 
ground. I'm not volunteering, at least not right now. If we're still 
having this argument in summer then I might take a look :-)

Mark