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Dirt Rag Articles
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How can the League of American Bicyclists, a leading advocacy organization for city riding, help those who want to ride on dirt? Three people involved in increasing urban trail riding opportunities tell us how:
Jeff Peel, Bicycle Friendly Community Program Specialist, League of American Bicyclists
Jill Van Winkle, IMBA Trail Specialist
Chris Bernhardt, Senior Planner, Alta Planning + Design
The Problem
It is one of the ironies of being a mountain biker: to hit the goods we frequently pile into cars with our buddies and head out to a state park or to the nearest National Forest. While this is a reasonable scenario on the weekends, we'd all like to ride our mountain bikes more during the week, and often don't have time on the weekend to devote an entire day to our favorite activity.
Unfortunately, mountain biking is frequently excluded from urban parks; where it is allowed, the trails can be crowded. This is partially because there are intense pressures on the small chunks of open spaces and parks that remain in cities after the rest of the land is used up for houses, buildings, and roads. Dedicated mountain bikers should not despair, though, as there are options that, although they will not result in an epic ride, will get them onto the dirt.
If You Can Make It In New York...
New York City is both the largest and most densely populated city in the United States, so open space is at a premium. When local advocates received permission to develop a small park with mountain bike trails, they knew it had to pack a lot of fun into a small space. The Highbridge Trails in Manhattan combine a dirt jump track, pump track, and tightly-wound singletrack peppered with technical features for a site that appeals to a variety of riders and is routinely full of local kids.
Fortunately, bike parks are popping up in cities both large and small, as riders and park managers are learning that better things can be done with that space where the neglected tennis courts are growing weeds and attracting graffiti. With the prevalence of skate parks obviating complaints about liability, bike parks are sure to grow in number in the coming years, creating after-work sessions and developing skilled groms.
Fat Tire Gentrification
There are typically dozens of large unused tracts of land in any city, but they are frequently overlooked because they don't look like places where mountain bike trails "fit." In Seattle, Washington, local riders got creative and worked with various public agencies to create the now-famous I-5 Colonnade Mountain Bike Park, serving up a wide variety of beginner through expert options underneath the west coast's busiest interstate. This development not only created a diverse riding opportunity, it helped to reclaim land that was primarily used for illicit activities, thus gaining the support of the neighbors.
In addition to freeway overpasses, nearly every large urban area has abandoned rail lines, utility corridors, or defunct industrial areas, all of which are "marginal lands" that beg to be redeveloped for mountain bike use. A good example is Wakefield Park, located in the DC metro area. It provides sweet berms and other bike-specific trails in a swath of land that had been avoided because it was a powerline right-of-way. Mountain bikers realized they could build a trail that was so fun a rider would not notice the overhead lines.
Ride to Your Ride
A common knock against mountain bikers is that we gladly hoist our bikes onto racks and drive to the closest trails. Wouldn't it be more fun, sustainable, and healthy to be able to ride bike lanes and pathways to the local park? Most cities have programs that install these types of facilities in an effort to increase bicycle use, and mountain bikers should encourage transportation planners to provide them to connect places with trails.
An ideal urban situation would be to use bike paths and bike lanes to connect small pieces of singletrack across several parks, allowing a rider to safely and efficiently ride from home, across town, and to and through half-a-dozen parks. An evening of riding could easily yield several miles of pavè combined with several miles of dirt, all without the aid of the internal combustion engine.
While having bike paths is important, there are a lot of riders who would be worn out by spinning their 40lb. bikes, replete with slack geometry and 2.5" tires, five miles to the local bike park. It is also likely that there are no safe bike routes to the trails. Fortunately, a determined rider can still get to that urban trail system—on the bus!
Most public transportation facilities are equipped to carry bikes on at least some of their routes, be they buses, light-rail, and/or trains; where bike-friendly transit does not connect to recreation areas, most transit providers are good at accommodating organized requests to add bike racks to buses. Publictransportation.org has links to information in all 50 states and every community with a public transportation system; good information to have when that skinny at the bike park destroys a derailleur.
Convincing the Skeptics
How do off-road advocates convince land managers, transportation advocates, and other open space users that mountain biking is a valuable park addition? How does building an off-road resource help cycling in general? Here are some great reasons that everyone should want bike trails or a bike park in their neighborhood.
Putting Kids on Bikes
The unstructured play experience that mountain biking provides inspires kids to explore the natural world and leads to positive associations with exercise. Providing more and safer opportunities for kids to ride can have a major impact on our nationwide physical inactivity crisis. Urban riding gets kids to stay on bikes, and makes riding "cool"—especially at the critical age, 16, when kids stop being active and disengage from the outdoors.
Skills for Trails and Roads
The skills learned on the trails make adept urban riders: a skilled biker has control of their bike and can swiftly adapt to any changes in their environment. The skills learned on a mountain bike trail or at a bike park are invaluable for biking on the road. As our nation invests more towards creating a safe environment for biking as a means of transportation, the focus needs to shift to creating skilled cyclists who are prepared to ride in all conditions.
Creating Commuters
Many riders began as mountain bikers, but found a love of the bike that transcends the setting. Soon, those dirt dogs want to ride as much as possible. They build up that old hardtail as a commuter, and hop curbs and pull wheelies to hone skills (and impress the neighbor kids) in the off-season while pedaling to the grocery store. Not everyone will become a transportation geek, but many have been transformed by bicycling off-road and will incorporate it into their daily routine. Mountain bicyclists are cyclists.
How to Get There from Here
The Bicycle Friendly Community (BFC) Program of the League of American Bicyclists was created in 2003 as a way to recognize communities that strive to improve conditions for cyclists and promote cycling culture. The program also provides technical assistance for communities to build better programs and policies for cycling. The BFC award application measures community efforts through a comprehensive series of questions across categories know as the Five E's: Engineering, Education, Encouragement, Enforcement and Evaluation & Planning. Twice a year submitted applications are reviewed and scored by a panel of experts and local cyclists. With generous support from Bikes Belong Coalition and Trek's One World, Two Wheels campaign, the BFC Program has grown to recognize 96 communities across 32 states and supported over 250 communities in their efforts to become better communities for cycling.
The award application has been updated throughout the past five years of the program. With help from IMBA, the League sought to improve questions regarding efforts to promote mountain biking in addition to recreational cycling. Now, alongside questions about bicycle transportation programs and facilities, the application asks about mileage of natural surface trails open to off-road cyclists, open space available to cyclists, proximity to mountain bike centers, and relationships between mountain bike advocates and the planning department.
Since the inclusion of mountain bike-related criteria, communities have not been shy about sharing what they've done. Chattanooga, Tennessee, has been recognized as a Bronze Level BFC, noting their Singletrack Mind Initiative—to build 100 miles of singletrack trails within 10 miles of downtown—in their 2005 application. Chattanooga is one of the towns that "gets it" and is working to create singletrack access from its existing and planned bike network of multi-use paths and on-road facilities like bike lanes. With a $10,000 grant from BFC partner Bikes Belong, they've already constructed 20 miles.
Chattanooga is in good company, and can borrow ideas from other communities involved with the program—like another Bronze Level community, Park City, Utah. Park City boasts an impressive 300 miles of trails, much of which is connected through a system of multi-use paths. The Chamber/Visitors Bureau to Developers recognizes the desire for these trails, creating friendly competition between developers to create better access to the trails. Realtors even include trail information in their property listings!
These are just a few examples of how cyclists of all stripes have used the BFC program as a tool to improve bicycling in their communities. The program not only offers a roadmap for how communities can improve, but gives the local politicians a goal to strive for and recognition for their commitment—a carrot to compliment the advocates' stick. While mountain biking and other recreational cycling facilities are only a small portion of the application, the off-road tribe can still benefit through the opportunity to build coalitions with others in the cycling community, and stronger relationships with local government.
Mountain bikers can get involved in the process of assessing your community. Get in touch with local transportation advocacy groups and let them know that you want to partner with them to improve cycling for all riders. Make sure that city bike planners know about your organization. Encourage them to apply for BFC status and offer to help with the off-road components.
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| Comment from James on 2009-03-20 |
| Ride to the trail because your parked automobile is a target for thieves. There's always broken car window glass at the places where people park to ride or hike. |
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