Martin's experience of trying to create a traditionally evidenced Permanent mirrors my own. I did a number of paper-evidenced DIY rides locally in East Anglia on lovely quiet roads and thought I'd like to share them as Permanents. But when it came to sorting controls with usable till receipts, things rapidly turned nightmarish and the routes were very soon severely compromised. If I found a workable set of controls, it would usually be OK Mon to Sat but a no-no on Sunday when places are shut. Not to mention the difficulty of writing a paper routesheet covering many junctions where there are no signposts or individual features at all to mark them out.
Now I have GPS, I don't even consider a paper-evidenced ride, except for those particularly attractive Calendar events such as The Dean or The Elenith, for which I'm prepared (just!) to travel and pay for accommodation.
Do others see traditional perms which go way overdistance in order to get receipts as an endangered species against the tide of technology that allows GPS perms to be nailed down to exactly eg 200km by the clever siting of controls? or is there still a demand for new perm routes?
My best guess is that the GPS method will progressively overtake the paper-based method far faster than many expect, even more so now that we can ECE a Calendar event by GPS, thus getting the best of both worlds i.e. not having to drive to the event and getting to social pleasure of riding with companions.
This does however raise what we might call an ethical question - and we may have discussed this elsewhere on another thread - as to whether it's acceptable for an organiser to create a fresh Permanent ride available only on a GPS basis, no paper routesheet available. Personally, I haven't thought this all the way through - as a knee-jerk reaction I think I'm for it but I can see how some people might object.
This is not the same thing as saying the GPS method will kill off the paper-based ride because it won't - there will long be a desire for the latter in part of our constituency and so it should remain - broad church and all that. It's just that I can't see many Organisers coming forward to incorporate new Perms on a paper basis when the GPS way is so much easier.