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Kaputar liberation 6-Jul-2018 At 12:45:38 PM Vwills

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>Short of the back and forth here of the battle, what means are there for
>a real public awareness campaign? Perhaps the guidebooks would be the best
>place to spell this out for a generation that have never had rock mentors
>other than the gym top-rope?

Unfortunately the main retro bolter and crew in the Kaputar incident were not fresh from the gym, but spouted many of the arguments that Ian outlined in his article. Short of speaking directly to the main retro bolter, making this issue public on the Queensland access site on FB, where it created a lot of discussion, and posting here, and doing the magazine article, and having an ethics blurb on thecrag that people probably ignore, I am not sure how to disseminate the alternative view that not everything needs to be bolted except to mentor people into the joys of trad climbing, and when all else fails remove the bolts, which is hard and sad work.

At Kaputar there is plenty of rock. Why those bolters seemed to target existing routes is quite bizarre but I can only assume they did so deliberately to make things more "accessible".If they had used their energy ( and improved their bolting skills) to put up independent new routes people might have grumbled about style, but I can think of 2 areas on Lindsay rock tops with easy access, no existing routes, no easily protectable trad lines that would support 25 new sports routes to grade 20 on rock as good and as well featured as that around thanks for the Mammaries etc.

I would rather not see that happen, but if that had occurred we would be respecting differences.