We prefer Adopters to record online the date they walked a PRoW and what they found, because then everybody can see that our PRoWs are getting checked annually. Adopters type in these findings on a shared spreadsheet: your District Spreadsheet.

When they find issues, they need to be reported with their Highways Authority reporting tool (see below for screenshots of Essex Highways).

The 10,000 PRoWs page enables you to find and open up your District's spreadsheet. There is a sample screenshot below.

When you open your District Spreadsheet for the first time, it will say 'View only'. To make changes to it, you will need permission. The 1st Time Access page describes how to get permission.

Recording your findings in your District Spreadsheet

Open the spreadsheet. At the bottom of the screen, select the PRoWs tab (see screenshot below)

• scroll up and down to find your Parish, and the row for the path you walked (eg row 582 in the screenshot below)

• enter the date in col A (dd/mm/yyyy)

• make notes of what you found in col B (if there were no issues, use the phrase 'no issues'. Type in as much or as little as you want; it is mainly for your benefit when you return next year.

• if you find an issue, record it with your Highways Authority (see below) and record the Reference no. they issue you with in col C when you get it

• record priority in col D (we are currently trialling the use of 'priority': P3 is used for issues suitable for P3 [Essex Highways Parish Paths Partnership] teams; P1 is for safety/urgent issues; P2 is everything else. See Advanced Guide for details of the P3 scheme)

• if you select ❓ click for help updating this spreadsheet, you will arrive at this website, on this page

• if you select ❓ click to report issue to Highways Authority, you will open up your Highways Reporting page (see below)

Unable to Edit Spreadsheet?

Occasionally, you might find that you are suddenly unable to edit your spreadsheet when you had quite happily done so in the past.

This is usually caused by you Browser 'forgetting' your Google login details.

To fix this:

• close your Browser (hopefully your Browser is set to 'Continue where you left off' so you don't have to reopen all the Browser tabs you had open)

• click on your District spreadsheet tab (or open its bookmark/favourite)

• click on the 'your account' disc at the top right of the screen (see screenshot below)

• fill in the details

This should restore your Editing rights

Essex Highways Tell Us reporting page

• most people will use the Essex Highways Tell Us reporting tool

• it was updated in June, 2020

• its described as Beta software (which means it contains a number of bugs)

Beware of the following:

• before you provide details of the issue you are trying to report, you will have to select the 'Public Rights of Way' category, and then choose from one of a further 8 primary categories

• you then enter your location, and zoom and scroll in to the particular spot on the PRoW where the issue is located

• you might be presented with some coloured blobs marking known issues, the idea being that you don't re-report a known issue. However 28 days after an issue has been inspected, it is no longer visible on the map (even though remediation might still be outstanding) so you still might be reporting known issues

• when you click on the PRoW, you will be presented with a dialog box stating the name of the PRoW, and offering a button to 'Report an Issue here'. Click the button.

• you will then be presented with some more secondary categories - the number depends on which of the primary categories you selected

• warning: if you find you chose the wrong 'primary category' and go to the top of the form and change it, you will have to re-enter your location details

• select a secondary category

• most of the time (depending on what categories you selected, you will then need to fill out another form:

• type in location again, then type in details, then upload any photos you took, then type in your email address, and finally, (finally), press submit

• an Issue Reference number will be shown on the screen - please type that in to your District spreadsheet

These steps are described on an Essex Highways Help Page, and also below:

Scroll down to the bottom left of the block of 8 icons, and select Public Rights of Way issues

Scroll down some more and select the icon for the category of issue you are reporting

(See the Advanced Guide page for specific information on the issues you might have come across.)

Scroll and zoom to find the particular point on the path where the issue is. Double click, which causes the map to zoom in. Keep double clicking until you see a dialogue box saying 'report an issue here' - then click it:

You will probably have to click another icon, and might even have to confirm again that "you still want to tell us":

Finally, you can provide some details:

• you must describe the location (which is odd because you just marked it on a map)

• you must type in some details to "Describe the issue"

• it is a really good idea to upload some photos if you can

• please provide your email address because only then will you get a record of what you reported

After that, press Submit.

The information will be uploaded, and an Issues Reference number will be displayed. And if you successfully entered your email address, after (typically) a matter of minutes, you should get an email back with the same Issue Reference number.

Please type that back into your Parishes, Adopters spreadsheet, column C.

These Issue Reference numbers will help us measure the impact that the PPA is having. (If there are two issues on the PRoW, so you are given two numbers, type them both in, separated by a comma or space).

If you select 'tell us about another issue', you will then be taken back to Essex Highways homepage, to start the process again.