A visit to Ashtead Common
The Open Spaces Society has had a strong connection with the City of London Corporation all through its history, and we helped the city acquire many of its open spaces: Hampstead Heath, Epping Forest, Burnham Beeches and the Coulsdon Commons. It was therefore fitting that, as one of our 150th anniversary events, we should visit…
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Derek Smith
A former activist in south Wales and a good friend of the society, Derek Smith, has died aged 88. Derek and his late wife Nina (our local correspondents for the Vale of Glamorgan from 1999 to 2002) were an indomitable pair of path and amenity defenders over many years. Together they saved a pretty footpath…
Read More‘Invisible fencing’ project at Epping Forest
This video describes the City of London’s innovative ‘invisible fencing’ project at Epping Forest developed since 2011. The project, supported financially by Natural England and in partnership with the manufacturer Lacmé, has enabled the re-establishment of free-range cattle grazing across the Site of Special Scientific Interest (SSSI). The project has lowered the costs of re-establishing…
Read MoreA clever solution
Our local correspondent for Leeds, Jerry Pearlman, has told us of an ingenious solution by Leeds City Council to prevent paths being lost in rivers such as the Wharfe. The council had a fund of about £100,000 to be used to reinstate paths which had fallen, or were in danger of falling, into watercourses. Parts…
Read MoreHelp test new self-closing bridle gates
In 2011 The British Horse Society conducted a trial of commercially available self-closing bridle gates. The trial recorded a number of issues which meant that there was an impact on safety and ease of use by horse riders. This confirmed anecdotes that horses and riders were suffering injury; and many were being put off accessing…
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The Elinor Ostrom Award for practitioners: video
The society was proud to receive the first Elinor Ostrom Award for practitioners, two years ago in Japan. This time, our general secretary Kate Ashbrook was one of the judges. She went to the biennial conference of the International Association for the Study of the Commons (IASC) in Edmonton, Canada, in May and presented the…
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Beautiful scenery needs to be seen
Our general secretary, Kate Ashbrook, talks to That’s Oxford TV about the society’s work in ensuring that the countryside is accessible to all and remains so.
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Commons registration: a half century
Fifty years ago today, 5 August 1965, the Commons Registration Act became law. The Open Spaces Society had pressed for the registration of commons for decades, and it was one of the principal recommendations of the Royal Commission on Common Land in 1958. During the passage of the Commons Registration Bill the society secured a…
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Silver jubilee of village-green revival
It is twenty-five years since the gates reopened to allow people to register land as a village green where that land had failed to be registered under the Commons Registration Act 1965. On 1 August 1990, a quarter of a century ago, the society led the way in advising people what they could do, with stories in the…
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Championing Chiltern commons
As the Chilterns Commons Project comes to an end, project officer Rachel Sanderson reflects on its achievements. In the south-east of England, a large number of small commons provide important recreational facilities for people in urban and semi-urban communities. Over the last four years, the Chilterns Commons Project, run by the Chilterns Conservation Board, has…
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