Probably more dogs are walked on public urban footpaths than forest footpaths. So the deluge of solid and liquid waste reported by The Guardian is not confined to 'lesser walked' footpaths.
Most concentrated places to find excess dog waste is on the school run because ignorant parents actually think that they are being very clever in killing two birds with one stone. (Children to school and toileting their animals.) When, in fact, they are ensuring that a good proportion of children are actually traipsing filth straight into school. Even those who pick it up cannot do so without leaving traces of it behind, of which the traces are full of germs, pathogens, parasites (especially those fed on the ever increasingly popular raw diet 🤢 - salmonella spreaders) - unless of course your dog produces hover turds and they don't actually touch the ground.
The children proceed into school taking in varying amounts of solid faeces, down to trace amounts. They walk it all over the class carpet area where children sit, often for long periods of time. Here they put their hands down on the carpet, play with their own shoes and even the shoes belonging to the person sat next to them. I have watched children pick dog shite out of the tread of their own shoes.
Parents then wonder why there is so much 'noro virus' around at any given time of the year, when in fact it comes from the sewage left behind from lazy dog owners who cannot possibly bear the thought of toileting their own animals on their own property. So they regularly take them out to foul public property.
My grandchildren's pushchairs have to go in my car and also into my house. Why would I want to have to trail them through streams of dogs piss and heaps of shite spread far and wide, which are more often than not, the full width of the pavement?
If a dog can be trained to sit it can be trained to defecate on demand, like service dogs are. Grot up your own property - not public property.
Barbara Woodhouse will be spinning in her grave.