To think Parkrun shouldn't take priority over the rest of the public?

[MaryRoze]

9.30am every Saturday, our biggest park is inundated with Parkrunners. There are hundreds of them.

They take up the 3 biggest car parks (including the one at the start of the dog walking trail), meaning I need to park at the furthest away one. Not a problem except I can't get to the furthest away one because volunteers stop the traffic to let the runners go past.

Once I get parked, I'm pushed to the side of all the main paths because they're running 3 or 4 abreast. I try to go down the muddier gravel paths, but they're down there too. An older couple today got a "fuck sake" because they couldn't move out of one runners way quick enough.

Parents are being stopped from crossing the path between car park and playground with their kids because the runners are passing by.

I get that Parkrun is fantastic for people's physical health and mental health, and it's clearly very popular but AIBU to think they need to be courteous of other park users too?

Couldn't agree more!

Totally agree, but unfortunately cult of running is unlikely to change any time soon.

Here they run down a canal path that’s the only route under a bridge. It’s really annoying.

No, I disagree, it’s a first come basis, park runs mostly last between 60/90 mins.

It’s the same with any public car park.

It’s a maximum of 2 hrs a week.

It's literally for an hour on a Saturday morning. Could you not do your dog walk before or after?

It’s not going to stop so you need to adapt your time or go somewhere else

I can and do walk my dog at different times of the day. But the older couple with their dog? The parents with their kids? Do they also need to change their schedules just because Parkrun HAS to be this 90 minute slot on Saturdays?

No.

It is what it is. I would much rather see people getting together once a week for an hour or so celebrating health and exercise than the local drunkards taking up at the benches and drinking (yep witnessed that this morning walking the dog) and other Asbo behaviour that happens constantly in our park.

I'm far to lazy to actually go and do a park run but surely if you are driving there then just go to a different park or go at a different time. For the entire rest of the week the park is presumably empty. There are a few park runs near me but if I really wanted a nice walk I wouldn't go to the same place as them at the same time.

Honestly it’s for a brief window each week and we now never go over on Saturday early mornings to our park, I can’t get worked up about this.

If you go half an hour later at 10.00am, probably 90% of the cars and runners will be gone.

@MaryRoze so you would prefer that it gets scrapped for the convenience of other people who may or may not want to walk their dog during that one particular hour of the week? You said yourself it's a great initiative. It's good for people's health, it's social and there really is no way to contain it unless you cap numbers which would be ridiculous.
Sorry but you are definitely being unreasonable.

It's once a week for a couple of hours. Just go somewhere else or wait a bit. I don't do park run but think it is a fantastic idea. You can go from 10.30 am for the rest of the weekend.
They do it in our two local areas and we just avoid them when dog walking then

I voted yanbu because I think those running should be more considerate and polite of those around them. But, ultimately it's less than 2 hours a day and it's usually fairly early in the day too so plenty of time for the rest of the users of the park.

Its once a week for an hour, so not too intrusive.
I'm not an early riser so haven't often been in the park when it's on, but when I have I've not had issues sharing the park with them.

No, I absolutely don't want it to be scrapped. I think it's great that people are out socialising and exercising. What I take objection to is taking up EVERY path in the park. Could they not avoid the area near the playground or dog walking trail? The park is big enough for everyone, but others are being prevented from doing their own exercise in favour of the parkrunners.

It takes up a tiny part of the week and it's at the same time so it's very easy to work around it. YABU.

There are 48 hours in a weekend, surely one hour a week for people to run 5k is better for the broader public good?

The runners shouldn't be swearing at passersby though, and if I were you I'd drop an email to the organisers to get them to remind the runners about how to interact with the public.

YABU, it's a minor inconvenience to you. Parkrun is a great social activity and encourages people to exercise.

I’m a regular park runner and I’ve been to about 20 different ones. None of them have involved stopping traffic or pedestrians so you must be particularly unlucky with your local one. They always announce at the start that we don’t have sole use of the park and to give way to other pedestrians etc.

It is a pain in the ass, yes. But I just avoid that time

It would be worse to stop the 100s of people doing something physically & socially healthy for 90 minutes, than to inconvenience a few others

Greater good and all that

Agree some could be more considerate though!

If the runners can't ask me civilly to move, I'd be tempted to deliberately dawdle in their way.

If you have concerns about the route or the conduct of runners message the organisers. But honestly I think far more people benefit from it than get annoyed by it.