Rider urges drivers to slow down

Margaret Wright helps her mother run Fostermeadow Farm Riding School, and says she regularly uses the back roads in the surrounding areas to exercise her competition horses.
The 24-year-old said: “Having got my BHS riding and road safety certificate I know the importance of wearing hi-viz and will never leave the yard with out being kitted out head to toe in hi-viz.
“There have been a number of campaigns on the safety of horse and rider and even videos showing drivers how to pass a horse correctly, but still I am finding that drivers either don’t have a clue or are just completely ignorant.”
Speaking last Friday, Margaret said: “Just today I asked a driver to slow down which he failed to do he had a trailer on the back that was making a lot of noise.
“I was on a very experienced horse but it distressed my horse very much resulting in him jogging and turning his hind quarters to the trailer — a horse’s natural reaction to something coming behind them that seem to be a threat.
“I shouted, ‘I asked you to slow down’.
“The answer back was the middle finger.”
Horse riders in the past have told of being subjected to verbal abuse by motorists in the Annan area.
But Margaret, who has been riding since the age of five, said: “It’s not just horse riders that are in danger, a lot of these little roads are used by cyclists, runners and dog walkers.
“These back roads are full of twists and turns and you never know what’s going to be round the next corner.”
Margaret says that many drivers are respectful and considerate of horses on the road.
But critical of the less thoughtful motorists, and with horses set to be increasingly common sight in coming weeks, she said: “We urgently need to get these drivers to take note and slow down or one day it will result in something terrible.”