VANCOUVER -- Stanley Park needs to protect environmentally-sensitive areas from cyclists, says a West End resident who witnessed a group cycling in a prohibited area.

Alison Martin said she and her husband Leif Oddson were walking on Ravine Trail, which runs under Pipeline Road between Beaver Lake and the seawall, on Sunday around 3 p.m. when the incident occurred.

Martin said they were passed by about 25 cyclists despite the fact that there are bike gates and signs saying bikes are prohibited at both ends of the environmentally-sensitive trail.

“My husband said nicely, ‘This is a no-cycling-trail, it’s posted.’ The guy said something like, ‘We don’t care’ or ‘I know.’ The third cyclist basically told us to take a hike,” Martin said.

Oddson informed every cyclist that passed that it wasn’t a cycling trail and that the ravine is an environmentally-protected area but “they just kept ignoring us”, Martin said.

The trail is protected because it is a riparian area with a high diversity of plant species, and is used extensively by park wildlife.

Martin said as the group passed she called 311 — the city’s non-emergency phone number in Vancouver to find out information and connect with the right department to make a complaint.

“It was so shocking to see,” she said.

Daria Wojnarski, a Vancouver park board official, said park rangers responded to Martin’s call.

“It is now on their priority list to monitor the area,” she said.

Trouble with cyclists is nothing new in the park, in July a collision between a pedestrian visitor and a cyclist on the seawall sent the 43-year-old tourist to hospital with three broken vertebrae, a broken knee and a broken toe.

Wojnarski said the board doesn’t keep statistics on the number of conflicts between cyclists and pedestrians on either the seawall or trails in the park.

A West End resident for 14 years, Martin said she and her husband walk Ravine Trail and around Lost Lagoon almost every weekend in spring, summer and fall and that they regularly see bikes on both trails.

“I think there needs to be better policing of these eco trails. I think there needs to be cameras. I think there needs to be big, big signs saying ‘We will fine you. What you’re doing is illegal.’”

Constance Barnes, park board vice chair, said what happened to Martin and her husband is unacceptable.

“I’m angry,” said Barnes. “ ... I’m a cyclist. I’m angry that this has happened. It’s incredibly disrespectful.”

But Barnes said she didn’t have an answer to deal with the problem.

“We need to figure out what we can do better,” she said. “We will follow it up.”

Robyn Worcester, conservation programs manager, Stanley Park Ecology Society, said while she’s noticed a big increase in the number of cyclists in the park this summer, she said it was “unusual” to see a group on Ravine Trail.

She said she had seen large groups of cyclists in the park but they walked their bikes in areas where riding is prohibited.