Tag: Permission

The September session in the SOA’s monthly online Community Conversations series focused on access to orienteering areas and navigating permissions. Arranging access for orienteering is often viewed as at best a drain on clubs’ organisational resources and at worth a headache that ultimately can thwart an event from happening. So how can clubs work best with landowners and tenants, to get good outcomes all round?

Building Good Relationships with Landowners

As for pretty much everything, building relationships is key – whether with individuals where land is in private hands or with employees as representatives of statutory or charitable organisations (councils, Forestry Land Scotland, RSPB, National Trust, MoD etc). Finding out who exactly to speak with can sometimes take a bit of detective work but persevere and engage positively: we are all ambassadors for our sport. There may be other land users to build relationships with too, to achieve good outcomes. Shared use is the norm, whether with the general public or with other specific interest groups (mountain bikers, archers, clay-pigeon shooters etc).