A key recommendation from the Icarus consultation in 2006 was vetoed by SWT and the Natural England representative. This was for the moor to have an on-site worker who could be there for a minimum number of days, hopefully several each week. He could deal with ongoing repairs and various issues which inevitably crop up on a recreation site of this size. He could keep an eye on the success or otherwise of any work or strategy being implemented. More important he would be there to develop a relationship with the place and understand its character. He could liaise with visitors and get early warning of any problems. The conservation tendency did not like this idea. They believed that cattle would be better.
Just to examine this in a bit of detail in respect of one matter. About 18 months ago SWT sent a team down to put barriers across a popular path to stop people using it.
The idea was that the eroded bare peaty track would get chance to recover. Very soon afterwards SWT's cattle were introduced to the site and spent a lot of time churning up this path because their reading standard was not up to the level required to interpret SWT's notice. Nothing was done about this, tracks were created at the side of the barriers more definite than anything there before and the area became worse than before. Nobody from SWT came along to do anything about it so people decided to ignore the instruction to walk elsewhere. Now a site worker would have been able to make a decision about removing the barrier very soon when it was obvious it wasn't working. As it is the barriers are still there 18 months later and now nobody takes any notice of anything SWT says.
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