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parkrun has got more people in this country taking part in exercise than the Olympics legacy ever did....and doeskin cost the country a penny......
There is a way that the parkrun can continue perhaps with a different name. A club could be formed and all those who do the weekly "parkruns" must join the club. The club subscriptions could be quite small say £5 per annum. The club could affiliate to the Association of Running Clubs. Affiliation fee £320 for a club with 300 members. This would provide liability insurance for the weekly runs.. The club could pay the parish council a fee, say £1000, for the use of the park. The weekly run would be free to enter for club members.
ARC has put in place just such an arrangement for a weekly park run in the Midlands.
It's possible that the city council will have a quiet word with these buttnozzles, then. Bristol has always had a good track record (relatively) for stuff like cycling, too- I suspect that they wouldn't want to see this sort of crap associated with them, even unfairly and indirectly.
https://www.change.org/p/stoke-gifford-parish-council-keep-little-stoke-parkrun-in-little-stoke-park
Let them know officially, 12000 names already
also Stoke.gifford@btconnect.com is the councils email. They might be interested in some direct feedback
And this a link to their website for their individual email. http://www.stokegifford.org.uk/index.php/p-councillors-new?view=featured
What a shame, the decision is both short-sighted and senseless. It's a sad state of affairs when health, community and well-being is being sacrificed for the sake of money.
I have signed the petition and I hope that the decision is reversed.
This is typical of the unelected, corrupt, arrogant, pompous clowns that run local councils. It is a dark day for humanity when freedom and rights have been taken away.
So a group of runners can turn up and run and there is no impact on the park !!
But a group of runners can turn up and run ( with a paid Director ) and there is an impact on the park !
Well done Dean for providing those links. Up to 15000 now. It says 25000 required for the issue to be forced further.
Official park run response...
http://www.parkrun.org.uk/news/2016/04/12/parkrun-reaction-to-stoke-gifford-parish-council-decision/
Newsthump's take on it.
http://newsthump.com/2016/04/13/park-to-install-coin-operated-swings-a-premium-slide-and-a-members-only-roundabout/
I agree that the decision is a poor and short-sighted one, but extreme reactions don't help anyone. Actually, as already set out, a great many local councils actively support parkrun - this decision is so notable because it is atypical.
Also, whatever else the parish councillors might be, they aren't unelected, and I would be very careful about throwing the word 'corrupt' around.
How do they calculate £1 per runner per run of damage? That would be over £10k per year of maintenance? Must be an amazing park......
It smells of a parish council trying to scam some extra funding with a grant out of the county council. I am not sure they would be allowed to enforce parking charges and keep the income themselves (parish councils do not normally do that).
If they were genuinely concerned about damage I am sure that if they asked to put some collection buckets at the start a couple of times a year and ask for contributions I am sure they would collect all they needed.
Sounds like discrimination against a specific set of park users.
I came across this scan on Twitter via @nwise, apparently this is the Parish Council's twisted reasoning. https://pbs.twimg.com/media/Cf3ojHkW8AA11vL.jpg
Their argument is as barmy as the one that cyclists should pay for the damage they cause to roads. I agree that is smells of a council trying to use Parkrun to screw an extra grant out of somebody and Parkrun have declined to be used like that.
Users of swings and gates watch out, you're causing unacceptable wear and tear too.
Why does it say they monopolise the park on Saturday and Sunday?
There is a junior parkrun on a Sunday. They have not required junior parkrun to pay up at present.
I do agree that they are being bastards, but I don't think all of the reasoning in their statement is that illogical. I think many things about parkrun are very good, but one of the things I don't like is the prevalent 'parkrun is unequivocally good and can do no wrong' attitude - it's not that surprising that not ALL local residents love having the parkrun there, and it's not implausible that some parkrunners park on the grass verges and in other less-than-ideal places, and that some parkrunners get in the way of dog walkers and other park users. It's also perfectly true that lots of parkrunners come from outside the area, and that locally-funded facilities like toilets are going to be getting a lot more use. A response from loads of parkrunners across the country that basically says 'well you're just wrong and none of your concerns are valid' is not necessarily going to be that helpful in changing their minds.
Just chuck them a fiver and say most turned up and did not want to pay.
What they going to do. arrest you, ban you or close the event... all rubbish imo
Normal duties have resumed.
I agree with you, literatin, but instead of dealing with the problems they've killed off a sporting activity that is welcoming to all and made themselves look petty and stupid. They could have dealt with the parking problems and addressed issues with other park users. They could even have come up with ways to make money from parkrun, such as parking charges or a cafe (our two cafes in the park are absolutely heaving after parkrun).
The cafe gets 15-30 extra customers after parkrun Every week so therefore parkrun is probably covering the cost of the toilets and more.
It seems small minded to tax parkrun instead of putting in place and enforcing suitable parking restrictions. But maybe that would require investment and killing off parkrun won't.
I thought this would be unenforceable but effectively no money equals no consent for event which means no insurance. Checkmate - no event.
It seems that South Glos council which leases the park to the parish council has a policy of not charging for parking. Maybe it should have made an exception? I know the parish council seemed to want to "pick on" parkrun though which suggests to me that someone's nose was out of joint somewhere - numbers have increased, maybe they didn't like not having the park to themselves and their dog at 9am on a Sat?
They also said that charging more council tax was unfair because many parkrunners are from outside the area or locals don't use the park. In my area the town council has taken the opposite view and decided the residents of the town must pay for a venue even though the surrounding local parishioners probably use it just as much! It would be good to have a bit more consistency of approach.
Also if everyone took the view that you can't do parkrun if you don't live here I wouldn't be able to do any as my district doesn't have one although there are a few locally in other counties and districts. But you see it with rubbish tips and libraries too - the nearest one is just over a county border so you can't use it. It's the downside of local democracy.
Oh and many parish councillors are co-opted rather than elected. So not very democratic at all.
You know when your out for a run and you see other runners or your out for a bike ride cos you got that tri in June and you see lots of other cyclists? Remember that feeling you get that so many people are out exercising just like you. Getting ready to compete over hill, dale and road?
Well your wrong. Really really wrong. In fact if they gave out degrees in wrongness from Cambridge and Oxford you would get a double first with a distinction.
Most people do not take any regular exercise at all. In fact most don't take any irregular exercise either. They don't walk, or bike or run or swim or go to the gym. They just don't. If you regularly run your in a small minority. If you regularly run and cycle thats even smaller. If you swim as well your a bloody freak. Play football five aside? You oddball! Tennis? Badminton? Weirdo.
So what am i getting at?
No one cares other than a few thousand about parkrun thats why this can be done. It maybe all over the world but the numbers who take part are minuscule compared to the millions, nay hundreds of millions who care more about having an excuse to avoid exercise.
If parkrun disappeared over the next few months most wouldn't even know it existed.
And I'm speaking as a man with four bikes
parkrun is worth protecting and maintaining, but us runners should not be under any illusions that the general public give a flying wet one
You're bang on Stephen, in fact I would go so far as to say that anything that causes even the perception of inconvenience like unusual parking or sharing a path with somebody else will always be a perceived personal slight because we're programmed to notice differences and then construct them into a pattern that Dawkin's Selfish Gene responds to.
Chuck in a bit of a hubbub, extra people, lycra (!) and it matters not that it is only an hour a week when they are actually in bed instead of in the park, because the NIMBY instinct revs up before going into overdrive when they find out that "WHAT... AND THEY DON'T EVEN PAY!". People hate other people getting something for nothing, especially if it doesn't affect them.
We usually get around this by constructing bodies like councils to keep an eye on the collective benefits of things, but it's not a perfect system when the people on the council can't resist their baser instincts because they have no institutional checks or motivations in place.
What makes this farce all the more ridiculous is that their reasoning for charging won't even be be addressed by charging.
Parish councils are the lowest of the low in the hierarchy and those that I've come across in my work life tend to be populated by either the self-interested who hang on to the little bit of authority like grim death, or the co-opted who try to help, then just go with the flow before packing it in through frustration. Little Gifford made a majority decision that suits them, personally because they are the bottom feeders, because they could, and because they don't care if they do - perhaps until the aftermath slaps them back to reality through a bit of humiliation.
It's been claimed that parkrun has struggled to spread in the USA because people there don't really get the concept of getting something for nothing. Here it's the opposite.
The Times this morning has come out on the side of the council, but says that it's the sponsors, rather than the runners, who should pay, arguing that they're in effect using the council facilities to promote themselves via parkrun.
I never can remember who the parkrun sponsors are even.
i hope people do not travel there this weekend to do a protest run....I know the official one has been cancelled as fear that it will be inundated.....
hundreds travelling to object will just upset lots of locals who will think its none of their business.
If there is going to be an overturn of the decision.it has got to be because the local residents want it and put influence on the council
outsiders becoming involved will just be seen as outsider force....