Ken, your summary is correct I feel, look at all the bike shops that used to be in the area back in the 70's . compared to the few that are around now. same applies with petrol stations, greasy spoons even pubs. today bikes and cars are faster and more reliable so don't break down and need to stop on a journey. years ago a trip of 100 miles had no worries apart from if you were going to get there, now we travel to France in 8 hours door to door. many people had bikes for work transport, it was the cheap option. weather didn't matter, was it better in those days?
the local Sutton Benger bobby was always looking out for us, the difference being he turned up at home in uniform and we had to answer to parents. if we were lucky we ran open meggies but didn't race around town, we usually had pubs or clubs to meet at, there were less cars on the road. to be honest its how rural France is at the moment, 30 or 40 years behind..
we get so much grief from nimbys, every other village had a track of some description, scrambles, trials, mx or road, problem is land owners have sold off land and let townies in looking for peace. the older villagers took no notice, pressure from newbies and now solar farms has taken a lot of land where the yoof could let off steam.
blanket bans are easy to post, and saves plod time and resources as they only need to drive up and down and not have street walkers on patrol, it keeps the moaners quiet until they have trouble then a van load appears and all goes quiet, I miss the old days!!
