11 motorcycles seized in Thetford Forest for anti-social off-road riding

POLICE in Thetford conducted a ‘day of action’ at King’s Forest in Thetford on the 29th of March, seizing 11 motorcycles and 1 quad bike, issuing 13 tickets for traffic violations, 10 tickets for no insurance, 1 ticket for no MOT - and 19 Fixed Penalty Notices for breaching covid regulations. 

The operation was in response to issues caused by riders “abusing a site of Special Scientific Interest’ with off-road motorcycles reported to be causing widespread environmental damage to main by-ways in the area. 

Tackling the anti-social use of off-road bikes seems to be high on the list of Police at the moment, with some forces deploying specialist off-road teams and drone teams to specifically combat the nuisance riders using public byways and beyond. 

In this case, damage of the byways was so significant that local authorities erected signs highlighting temporary restrictions of using the area, for flora and fauna to recover - these signs were reported to be taken down repeatedly by 'people showing a blatant disregard for temporary closure'.

Sgt Brian Calver from the Wildlife and Rural Crime Team said in a release:

"It was a very satisfying day of action, and good to be able to seize the number of bikes we did. This offending was aggravated by the fact we were still within the COVID restrictions, so many of the offenders shouldn’t have been there at all. We have seen a lot of breaches in the area, particularly on Sundays,  with some offenders causing criminal damage by ripping the closure signs down. 

"They have been doing as they selfishly please with no consideration for the environment or the law-abiding public using the area.  I’d like to emphasise that byways open to traffic are roads under the Road Traffic Act and as such, any quad bikes or off-road bikes used must be fully road legal. We’ll continue to target this area and those that aren’t road-legal will be dealt with robustly, with vehicles seized, where we have the powers to do so.”

"A big thank you to Bedfordshire police for supporting us with the operation with some off-road capability – they were kind enough to bring a spare off-road bike for us to use as part of the activity."

Now, we love a green lane, so I think it’s important to remind Visordown readers that use of public byways by road-going vehicles is entirely legal, unless otherwise stated. If there is a sign up, take note of what it says - and make sure your bike has insurance and an MOT if you’re on the road! 

In fact, we reviewed the Honda X-ADV & Honda CB500X in Thetford Forest!