I used some of these suggestions and used the following solution:
I added the gesture recognizer to the bottom most superview in the heirarchy (and not the top most)
Then in that class over rid
-(UIView *)hitTest:(CGPoint)point withEvent:(UIEvent *)event
{
UIView *v = [super hitTest:point withEvent:event];
// if v is nil then touch wasn't in this view or its subviews
if (v == nil)
{
return nil;
}
// in any case if the topview was hidden than return the default value
if (self.myTopView.hidden)
{
return v;
}
// if the view isn't hidden but the touch returned a control - than we can pass the touch to the control
if ([v isKindOfClass:[UIControl class]])
{
return v;
}
// decide on what threshold to decide is a touch
CGFloat threshHold = 40;
// if the touch wasn't on a control but could initiate a gesture than that view should get the touch
if (v.gestureRecognizers)
{
threshHold = 30;
// return v;
}
// check if the threshold should be bigger
if ([self someCondition])
{
threshHold = 100;
}
// threshold according to its position - this is the dynamic part
if (point.y > (self.myTopView.frame.origin.y - threshold))
{
return self.handleBarView;
}
return v;
}