The Courier & Advertiser (Fife Edition)
FREEDOM’S MILESTONES
Covid-19 lockdowns saw more people exploring their local coasts and countryside. However, this occasionally brought disruption to rural areas. As restrictions ease, Michael Alexander explores their legacy
When the Fife Coastal Path was recently ranked in the world’s top 20 Instagrammable hiking trails alongside the likes of the Appalachian Trail in West Virginia and the route to Peru’s infamous Inca city of Machu Picchu, it came as no surprise to locals familiar with the stunning landscapes of Fife’s “fringe of gold”.
But with visitor numbers to local beauty spots increasing dramatically during the Covid-19 lockdowns, an appreciation for the beauty and elegance of what’s on our doorstep was tempered slightly by a spate of wild camping, littering and access problems.
Fife Coast & Countryside Trust (FCCT) Communications Officer Audrey Peebles says it’s “nothing new” for the Fife Coastal Path to appear on “best of ” lists.
However, there’s no doubt that the “massive peak” of local visitors — especially during
the first lockdown of 2020 — helped raise its profile, and the hope is that this appreciation of local destinations will continue.
“We hope that people who haven’t traditionally enjoyed a staycation will further appreciate how beautiful Fife is,” says Audrey. “Our award-winning beaches — known as the fringe of gold — are stunning. So hopefully, it’s opened their eyes to fascinating, beautiful places that we are lucky enough to live in.”
Data, measured by FCCT’s people-counting equipment, speaks for itself.
At the Newburgh end of the Fife Coastal Path, visitors were up 44% in March 2020 compared with the previous March. By April, they were up 62%, and by May, it was 90%. At Ardross, near St Monans, visitors using the path were up 78% last July and August, while in Kirkcaldy, walkers along Seafield and the Promenade rose by 138%. In July 2020, for all the sites that could be measured, a total of 183,883 visitors were recorded.
Despite people going back to work and being able to travel elsewhere, numbers have remained high, especially on the beaches.
The influx of people has, however, brought other well-publicised challenges.
During the first lockdown, the Lomond Hills were “just mental” with visitors “hundreds of percent up” causing problems when car parks overflowed and some parked irresponsibly. There have also been challenges caused by wild camping and increased levels of littering.
Richard Barron is chief operating officer for ScotWays (The Scottish Rights of Way and Access Society), the independent charity that upholds and promotes public access rights in Scotland.
He says some of the problems experienced
at beauty spots across Scotland, especially during the first lockdown, exemplified a “selfish, me first” approach to life by some individuals. However, he says if there’s one positive to have come out of the pandemic, it’s that more people have got out and about in their local areas to responsibly discover the beauty of the countryside.
“It’s been a really odd time,” says Richard. “What we’ve seen is people who were always prepared to go walking — the ones who would go mountaineering, drive from Edinburgh to the Cairngorms — they were feeling quite restricted in where they could go. You then had a second group — the ‘I always holiday in Ibiza’ folk — who also had to change.
“There’s been some places where a lack of people has really helped nature to bounce back. Those tended to be the places away from settlements. But you then saw local places around communities suddenly having this massive uptick in people wanting to literally get out there and just enjoy the countryside.
“That was a positive. The downside was you were having landowners thinking: ‘Holy hell, where’s all these people come from?’”
Under the Land Reform (Scotland) Act 2003, new rights of responsible public access to land and the countryside were introduced, meaning people have a legal right to be there, so long as they act responsibly.
However, instead of “one or two walkers a week”, problems arose when there were suddenly “20 or 30 a day”.
Richard says particular problems arose early in lockdown when, amid concerns that Covid-19 was transmitted through droplets
and touch, some landowners would lock gates, barring public access.
Another problem arose when people “not used to being in the countryside” started dropping litter. Add to this the furloughing of council and ranger staff, and when complaints needed to be investigated, it meant that in the early days, problems couldn’t always be resolved immediately.
This, however, was just the start. “When lockdown started to ease, and you didn’t have overseas travel, new problems arose,” Richard says. “For example, you had people going to Loch Lomond with their £10.99 festival camping kits. They’d cut the trees down, have a barbecue and campfire, and leave all their mess.
“One of the places that really had a problem with cars was up in Aberdeenshire at the Cairngorms. At Braemar, you had people finding the Linn of Dee car park was full, and everyone was parking on the road. That’s similar to what happened in Fife at the Lomond Hills. That sort of selfishness exacerbated the problems. Yet if people had a ‘plan B’, it could be avoided.”
Despite this, Richard said another positive to come out of the pandemic was that as awareness of problems grew, agencies such as NatureScot, VisitScotland and Police Scotland started to engage more.
He was also struck by how, after 30 years of campaigning to improve outdoor access and promote the physical and mental benefits of getting out and about, the pandemic “forced” people to discover it for themselves.
“In the space of a month, we had everybody walking locally, which is something we’ve been trying to do for decades,” he laughs. “That was a massive plus as people explored their local area, even though you had the problems for landowners.
“We’ve got climate change on the agenda, local travel means less CO2, less traffic — all those huge strategic things.
“But the pandemic has also helped tackle other existing problems. The North Coast 500 for example: a fantastic route and amazing marketing but really crap facilities that caused problems for locals.
“The Fairy Pools on Skye, Devil’s Pulpit at Stirling — these are really popular places but again didn’t have the facilities. What Covid did is get governments to think about it, to get councils involved. It’s banged people’s heads together. We’ve ended up with a tourism revenue fund. What we’ve got to do now is keep the pressure on to keep these improvements moving.”
While some destinations are well-trodden, the pandemic has also led more people to explore local, more obscure routes often tied in with local history.
Fife examples include the Old Kennoway Road running from near Cupar towards Chance Inn; the Waterless Road, which was the old road between St Andrews and Ceres that is now part of the Fife Pilgrim Way; and the Stratheden path near Springfield, where information boards explain that after a murder in the early 1960s, the road was closed off to travellers.
The Coronation Road was the route royals travelled between their palaces at Scone and Falkland, while in the Highlands, hikers can marvel at the history of the Battle of Glen Tilt, as it became known. Here, a dispute between Edinburgh botanist John Hutton Balfour and the 6th Duke of Atholl over a right of way in August 1847, led to the setting of an important land access precedent.
Often, however, it’s the history of signs and mile markers themselves that captures the imagination.
The Romans can take credit for first introducing roads and signage to Britain to aid the movement of soldiers and supplies. They possibly marked every thousandth double-step with a large cylindrical stone. The Latin for thousand was “mille” and the distance was 1,618 yards. The eventual British standard mile was 1,760 yards, although “long”miles also existed into the 19th Century. After Roman times, roads developed to meet local community needs.
Turnpike roads were developed to overcome sunken lanes that often became quagmires. From 1767, mileposts were compulsory on all turnpikes, not only to inform travellers of direction and distances, but also to help coaches keep to schedule and for charging for changes of horses at the coaching inns.
Today, The Milestone Society lists the country’s surviving mile markers. These are listed as anything marking the miles (as required by the various individual and general Turnpike Acts), within which there are “classic” milestones of stone and generally later mile plates/mileposts of cast-iron.
Angus has a fair number of surviving milestones, as well as unusual “giant spike” mileposts by George Anderson of Arbroath and Carnoustie. It’s in east Fife, however, that some of the best surviving examples in the country can be found.
“In the time before mass production, there were endless variations in design produced by local craftsmen, some quite remarkable,” explains John Riddell of The Milestone Society. “It is surprising how many survive — often partly buried and hidden in the vegetation — with unknown ones still being found quite frequently.
“During World War Two in 1940, as part of preparations for the expected invasion, the government instructed all road signs to be removed. This usually involved ‘defacing’ milestones, and removing cast-iron mile markers, most of which disappeared into
the wartime scrap-metal effort. However the Eastern District of Fife has probably the best collection of surviving mile plates in Scotland. These were carefully conserved during World War Two and in modern times.
“Fife also developed the unique ‘Fife Cap’, a cast-iron cap fitting upon a granite milestone. In addition, there are historic cast-iron way markers at junctions, giving directions to local destinations. A good deal is known about the local foundries which produced these castings, the earliest established date being Alex Russell of Kirkcaldy 1824. There are also classic milestones surviving elsewhere in Fife, with some rare mileposts produced in Falkirk foundries. There are ongoing discussions about safeguarding them.”
The mile markers of Fife are a big subject, reflecting the complex evolution of the roads network from the agricultural revolution and as new industrial harbours were developed along the Forth. Some of the old roads became disused and are now no more than faint tracks across the fields. Other old routes, meanwhile, have been consumed by more modern infrastructure.
George Robertson, honorary president of the Dunfermline Historical Society, has been researching the story of Thomas Henry Tuckett, who surveyed the roads of West Fife during the mid-19th Century. He will soon publish his findings on the DHS website.
George has also researched the Great North Road between North Queensferry and Kinross alongside co-author Eric Simpson, of Dalgety Bay. Starting at North Queensferry, it went through Inverkeithing, followed the route of what is now the M90 up to Crossgates, initially to Kelty, through Blairadam then up as far as Kinross. Their main thrust was to investigate what infrastructure still existed in terms of toll houses, inns, change inns, milestones and blacksmiths.
“People’s lives were very much integrated into the infrastructure, there’s no question about that,” says George. “But while only parts of the infrastructure remain, the routes themselves often live on.”
IN THE SPACE OF A MONTH, WE HAD EVERYBODY WALKING LOCALLY, WHICH IS SOMETHING WE’VE BEEN TRYING TO DO FOR DECADES
Q
Where in the world are you happiest?
A Anywhere where I can have a laugh and forget the important things in life.
Q Favourite part of Scotland to explore?
A I haven’t explored a lot of Scotland but anywhere where there are some nice walks, beautiful scenery and a coffee shop will do.
Q
A Christopher Bell, artistic director of NYCOS (National Youth Choir of Scotland), and the way he can combine individual singers into an outstanding choir and produce some of the best choral performances all over the world.
Q
Who inspires you?
Your house is on fire, what one item do you save?
A My phone. I do everything on my phone and would be completely lost without it!
Q
Theme song for your life?
A You’ve Got a Friend in Me (Toy Story).
Q Last meal on Earth? A Chinese takeaway with prawn crackers!
Q Favourite holiday destination? A Barcelona.
Q Dream post-Covid dinner guests?
A Michael McIntyre, Darcey Bussell, Paul Hollywood and Nicola Benedetti.
Q First thing you’d do if you won £1 million? A Buy/build a ballet studio to house my ballet school.
Q If you could rule for a day, what would be the first thing you would do? A After having a cup of tea, I would have people talk about their mental health and how they are feeling to help reduce the stigma surrounding these difficult conversations. #itsoknottobeok
Q Tell us something about yourself that most people don’t know?
A I play the clarinet.
Q What was the last book you read?
A Love Your Life by Sophie Kinsella – I love reading but I only usually get a chance to read during the holidays. This book has been on the go since Christmas!
Q
If you could eat only one food for the rest of your life, what would it be?
A Chicken. I love chicken – it can be cooked so many ways – roast chicken, barbecue chicken, Balmoral chicken and so on.
Q What makes you happy?
A A cup of tea and a slice of chocolate cake.
Q What makes you sad? A The loss of a loved one.
Q Do you believe in love at first sight?
A Yes. If only Mr Right would come along soon!
Q Have you had a paranormal encounter? A No. Not sure I want to either!
Q If you could go back to any point in history, what would it be?
A I would go back to life in Jesus’s time and witness first-hand some of his teaching.
Q What is the best advice you have received, and who did it come from? A My personal trainer, Louise Johnstone, telling me to always finish strong.
Q What do you do to unwind?
A Watch some TV and do jigsaws.
Q Happiest memory? A Getting a standing ovation with NYCOS (National Youth Choir of Scotland) after singing Mozart’s Requiem in The Proms at the Royal Albert Hall.
Q And most embarrassing? A Can’t think of any.
Q Biggest regret? A Luckily, I don’t think I have any regrets. Life has been good to me so far.
Q What or who are you proudest of?
A My ballet students who work very hard during classes and pass their exams.
Q Who do you admire most?
A Those who have made achievements from humble backgrounds, when things maybe didn’t come easy but they have put the work in for an even sweeter reward.
Q
And who do you detest?
A I don’t dislike anyone enough to detest them. I like to think I get on with most people.
Q If you could turn back the clock what one thing would you change?
A I don’t think I would go back and change anything. What has happened has happened, and it has made each of us who we are.
Q
Write your own epitaph?
A She worked hard and liked helping others.