It seems that someone in the Gooise nature has a pee on mountain bikers. An unknown person regularly places obstacles such as thick branches or pieces of glass in the middle of the walking paths that are also used by cyclists. Dangerous for mountain bikers, among others, warns forest ranger Daan Eijben of the Goois Nature Reserve on NH Radio.
Dangerous harassment has been a problem for some time. “A hiking trail is then closed by someone with branches, because they probably like mountain bikers,” the forester of the area outlines.
“Then I ask weekly if the volunteers want to remove it and it comes back weekly.”
Glass in the ground
But it doesn’t stop there. “Recently someone also put glass in the ground, piercing it upwards. Then you are talking about an attempt at serious assault,” says the forest ranger who has worked for the police for a long time.
Fortunately, as far as the ranger knows, no one has been injured by these nasty obstacles so far.
Dangerous
Large branches on trails can be life-threatening for mountain bikers. Two years ago, a mountain biker in the Amsterdamse Bos suffered a spinal cord injury when he drove full on a tree stump and fell. After two and a half years of rehabilitation with no prospect of improvement, the man finally opted for euthanasia.