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?

Every Sunday they play football in my local park and lying in the middle of the pitch is the most unsettling sunbathing experience you'll ever have.

Why won't anyone think of Me

We are 700+ posts in and I don't think I've seen anyone asking for park run to be banned.

"And it is impossible for me to find any time in the other 167 hours a week to use my park and therefore I must use it at exactly the same time as this group exercise activity and will therefore get righteously annoyed that I can't have exclusive use of this part of the park at that time and have to share it with a load of runners and then claim that they are somehow excluding me because they are using the park at the same time as me."

First of all as I have said park runs should be kept (please read my posts before writing) but consideration should be given to other users of the park which often it seems is not.

what you are suggesting is that I adapt the way I walk my dog to accommodate other people’s preferences even though my dog is no fish. What difference does it make if my dog is walking ta my heel to being leashed ?

It's not all of the paths all of the time and it's a very very short window of time.

It's difficult to believe that some of the pathways being congested for 30-45 minutes once a week is causing a huge inconvenience to a large number of people.

Unfortunately, like with most things. You have to find a balance. Park run is a very much loved event with lots of benefits for lots of people.

If more people were complaining about it than we're taking part then it would be rethought but the fact is that most people don't care or are happy to see others exercising.

Person with 400acres at their disposal cannot find the space for a walk, and other unlikely tales

Why not?

Why shouldn't a couple of hundred people get to use a public place, over a few dog walkers?

Nobody has any more or less right to use such spaces than anyone else. Parkrun takes up 1% of the time available in a week in total if you assume 2 hours, and in reality the bulk of runners are going to be done in less than half of that.

I think that everyone agrees that parkrunners and other park users should be considerate of each other so there is not that much to argue about. Some people are not considerate which ruins things for everyone. I don’t think parkrun routes should block access to car parks - that specific thing I think is a valid complaint which could be made to parkrun HQ or the local team. I am suprised it was approved.

I cannot comment on your specific venue but the few PR 's i ve done use a variety of paths, some very unsuitable for all but the fittest of walkers and often in winter extremely muddy.

Plymouths main PR uses no more than 25% of the available path network, The PR nearest to me, uses muddy and very hilly paths that few walkers use, the rest of the course is very wide, the main body of the runners are past any individual walker within 30/60 seconds or so, this would be the case for all PRs.... you see the runners approach, stop, wait to one side for them to pass, then continue your walk.

Why is that such a biggy for you?

@MaryRoze - I have no skin in the game here. I'm not a runner & I no longer have a dog or small children. But with the obesity crisis the way it is & the state of the NHS, I think people should be applauded. It's once a week & you know when it is. Go somewhere else or choose a different time.

"No-one should be organising a regular, weekly mass activity in a public space which you happily recommend other people to avoid. The fact you're doing the same annoying thing at the same annoying time every fucking annoying week is not the great positive you paint it as.

And we have no idea how many people you are putting off going to the park with your antics."

Wow, you sound nice.

Yes exactly, any form of exercise should be encourage, inc long dog walks.

Personally, i like to take my dog to a variety of areas to walk and as i walk her more than once a day, adjusting timings very slightly would be no problem if sweaty runners offended me.

Nice to see some sensible dog owners here too x

There seems to be a lot of manufactured outrage on here. I used to live near Clapham Common, every weekend the space was full of people playing football, Frisbee, touch rugby, rounders, personal fitness coaches and if the weather allowed picnics and sunbathers. Everyone seemed to rub along fine. It was very much a case of first come first served. So you were not guaranteed that same spot of grass under the tree everywhere, you just found somewhere else to use. It is a public space and you had to be flexible!

@MasterBeth

Park run does commander exclusive use of the most used and valuable part of the park (the pathway network) during the session. This is the best bit of the park that most people want to use

You are arguing that lots of people shouldn't use part of the park because lots of people want to use that part of the park.

That's truly logic-free.

I just checked my local council's 2023 public spaces protection order (the law) -

• requirement to put dog on lead if instructed by an official
• dogs not to damage anything
• driving vehicles on park land without permission (except disabled scooters)
• banned- fishing, camping, sleeping out, fires, feeding any birds, interfering with or damaging signs or gates or stiles etc
• being in possession of metal detector or digging implement
• planting CCTV, trail cams, filming devices
• swimming in the ponds or lakes or wading in them without permission
• damage to trees and shrubs
• foraging in identified nature reserves

There are fees and licences for certain events.

Ah and found this "Permits are required for those wishing to use London Borough of xxxxx Parks and Open Spaces for commercial fitness and other small-group activities.
Such activities include:

• The provision of commercial services such as fitness training activities e.g., personal trainers, boot camps, group exercise or fitness classes.
• The provision of educational activities e.g. educational workshops, forest schools.
• Other small group activities, which do not otherwise constitute an event, where ‘small’ is defined as having 50 or fewer people."

All seems qut9e reasonably organised in my very busy London borough.

I am arguing that no one group of people should monopolise the most desirable part of the park for a period of time, so that other people can't use it, and can't make their way through the park.

It is not fair that only you and your gang should be allowed to use a path, just because there are hundreds of you.

Practically, that might mean use half the width of the path, run in single file, put a limit on numbers, run in two or three cohorts, run off the path. Just organise what you do so it won't inconvenience others. It seems that park run is some sacred event that May Never Be Altered.

Practically, that might mean use half the width of the path

Hard to enforce if people want to overtake. The only way to enforce it would be to use cones or tape or have loads of marshals/volunteers. Many PRs wouldn't be able to find the volunteers for this and they could not hold the event.

run in single file

As above.

put a limit on numbers

I don't know about this.

run in two or three cohorts

This would make the event last even longer and would be very hard to manage. People would need to 'enter' a specific cohort in advance.

run off the path

Many PRs actively ask runners NOT to do this as it can churn up the grass during wet weather, thus spoiling the park.

Just organise what you do so it won't inconvenience others. It seems that park run is some sacred event that May Never Be Altered.

I imagine if enough people didn't want it to happen then it would cease to be a thing. People would either stop attending and/or stop volunteering and it would fold.

This is really a desperately crap hill to die on.

It is not fair that only you and your gang should be allowed to use a path, just because there are hundreds of you

@MasterBeth

I don't partake in ParkRun. I'm also aware that ParkRun isn't a gang, so you can't be the victim of that gang.

Groups of people sometimes gather in public spaces. If you can't cope, stay in.

I think the size of the park is a factor. My local park is small and basically the runners run right round the park on the main path so if you are in the middle you can't get out, if you are on the outside you can't get in. The runners don't pass that quickly as some are slower, some start later and I think they go round more than once. Car parking isn't an issue as there isn't a car park, the play area is within the running route so you are either cut off from it or trapped in it. Why can't they halve the route and run it more times so they are only cutting off half the park or just come off the path for a short distance so that the play area is accessible? I think it can be workable if people put some thought in to considering others.

Just to add the play area in the park is normally busy, this isn't a park that doesn't get used, it is also a shortcut between two roads with shops/banks etc so not unusual to use it as that particularly for people who can't walk far.

There is a large sports facility about half a mile from the park, sports clubs hire it, it would make a much better venue for parkrun, has loads of parking on site and no one would be inconvenienced. Are parkrunners just so entitled that they won't pay a small amount to hire a better venue?

As was so well stated above, you are arguing that a large number of people shouldn't use a public space so a smaller number of people can use it instead, and that somehow the people running are the selfish ones.

For 1% of the total time you have in a week (2%, if we generously discount 12 hours of each day when it's dark).

I agree.

Dog walkers can take their dogs any time. Parkrun is only for an hour a week (excluding the much smaller and shorter junior parkruns on a Sunday).

You could also take the view that if there is a parkrun nearby, the runners will generally go there on a Saturday morning, rather than clogging up the local streets.

Why can't they halve the route and run it more times so they are only cutting off half the park or just come off the path for a short distance so that the play area is accessible? I think it can be workable if people put some thought in to considering others

you can blame parkrun HQ for that, they don't like courses with more than three laps (although some older courses have more than 3 - eg Heslington in York (5), Brickfields in Dublin (4) and there's one in London that has 5 as well).