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The Unwanted July Cycle Story

Etape Caledonia should be angry - very angry. Bureaucratic bungling and mismanagement of the local authority side of this partnership promotion is shaping up to puncture what could have been a perfectly adequate public/private joint enterprise event.

This article was submitted for publication by a concerned member of the public who has NO PROBLEM with the cyclists at all.  It is published to illustrate just how easy it would be for things to go badly wrong on the day, without adequate and timely consultation with all parties to gain their understanding, support and full co-operation with such an event. 

What follows is a spoof

Mr and Mrs A offered their friends, Mr and Mrs B for a midsummer weekend break, their cottage in Perthshire, which they only occasionally use themselves.  Arriving after dark the Bs slept well and enjoyed a peaceful night.  

The next morning they drove off to explore. They reached the end of the cottage track and saw a couple of cyclists going past - then a few more. They assumed a cycling club was having a day out. They turned left and drove up the road. A few more cyclists came towards them but this time the Bs were shouted at.  They did not understand why.  When they got to the corner a bunch of cyclists smacked straight into them. There was carnage.  The Bs could not understand what was going on.  It was a nightmare.  

Cyclists shouting, bodies on the road.........chaos. One cyclist was seriously hurt and several had broken bones and serious bruising. The police set up a crime scene investigation and the race was abandoned. Mr B learned he had committed a criminal offence.

At the inquiry afterwards it was found that the Bs had no idea that the roads had been closed – by law.

*  Mr B was charged, fined and had points put on his licence. The Court did not send him to prison as there was substantial evidence he could not have known about the road closures.  

* The Local Authority was charged with maladministration for only informing those on the Voters’ Roll. It had not covered every unit of accommodation in the area.  

* The event organisers are in dispute with the insurance company over the public liability insurance.  The insurance company considers that “due diligence” had not been exercised.  The organisers had not ensured that the correct information had been fully distributed.   The fact that the route and timings were on a web site was not considered to be sufficient dissemination of information. Visitors to the area could not be expected to refer to a website they had never heard of, before going out for the day, from a house that had no internet access.  There was no information in the house, and no “marshal” at the end of the road.

The injured are investigating a group action for grievous bodily harm against Mr B, the Council and the organisers.  The Council is considering how things might be improved for 2008!

Remember, this article is a spoof– we hope!

The organisers and the authorities must understand that something may be LEGAL but simultaneously not LEGITIMATE.   For the Etape Caledonia Marathon to succeed, and to be sustained, it MUST BE LEGITIMATE.