I’m interested in people’s thoughts about flying on Hampstead Heath. For those that don’t know, Hampstead Heath is a huge area of open land in North London - in many ways ideal for drone flying.
It’s owned and run by the Corporation of London.
It’s clear that they’re not keen on Drones.
On their website they say: Flying drones for recreation is prohibited on the Heath.
Hampstead Heath rules and byelaws - City of London.
However I can’t see anything in their byelaws about drones (or model aircraft). And if you read their drone policy they say that the reason they ban drone flying is that they consider all of the Heath to be a congested zone and therefore drone flying there is illegal.
Of course, with the change in the rules it’s now perfectly legal to fly certain classes of drone in congested zones. So presumably it’s now legal to fly in hampstead heath.
So one option is fly there but face the possibility of having to argue with park authorities.
Or avoid in completely - thereby missing out on one of the best London sites.
Is there a third option where we as a community try to engage with the corporation of London to come up with a sensible drone policy? Perhaps certain areas where drone flying is or isn’t encouraged?
And if so, is there a group than can do this and make representations on behalf of the drone hobbyist community?