Trail proposal for comment

[nimrodx]

Showgrounds track

Hi All

Another track -- I've called this one bav-b for the moment (just for conversation -- I am sure there will be other proposals).

Jason and I had a look there this morning. I am not 100 % sure of property boundaries.

This is the showgrounds loop. I have not used any of the showground's existing roads (too boring, too many horsey people who may be upset
by bicycles). In current form it is about 5.4 km.

The key challenge of this one, in my view, is actually making it intersting. Hence the name - bav-b (barely avoiding boredom).

Anyway, let me know what you think of it.

http://i1125.photobucket.com/albums/l596/nimrodx/bav-b.png

The skills park is proposed for the southern end of this thing, with various grades of beginner and up dirt jumps in one of the loops of the cri track.
http://i1125.photobucket.com/albums/l596/nimrodx/bav-b2.png

Kind regards

Matt

 

[SCHOEY]

Oh and by the way who did I see at work today with the spesh enduro on the back of hes ute?? Im thinking schoey? or whoever?

Where do you work Phill? Was prob me I had the bike with me today.

Jason

 

[nimrodx]

Jube trails

HI All,

A summary of proposals for Jube.

some extensions to rollercat:
http://i1125.photobucket.com/albums/l596/nimrodx/rollercatexts.png

noobs 1 and 2, plus rollercat and the turkey all in one:

http://i1125.photobucket.com/albums/l596/nimrodx/Jube.png

a close up of the proposed link from noob 2 to sandstone:

http://i1125.photobucket.com/albums/l596/nimrodx/linktosandstone.png

What is missing?
Cheesburger Mk II -- have not had time to do it, but definately will.
The extension up from the Gazebo -- which is already approved.

Kind regards

Matt

 

[aussie pete]

Great work Matt, I like everything you have proposed but I have to bring up one minor concern, if this has already been discussed or is not considered an issue then ignore this post. Having a skills park/dirt jumps in one of the crit loops could be seen by roadies as a problem because of us mtbers walking/riding across their track dragging dirt and small stones onto it. As I said if this is not an issue ignore it but we won't want to piss the neighbours off.

 

[Road Rage Ryan]

Matt,

Great work on all of this. You ar a man possessed at the moment. To be honest the idea that you could ride Cheeseburger then MKII then down the noob trails either all the way down to the rock garden or ride one of he noobs then onto Turkey would be amazing.

Good Luck

 

[SCHOEY]

Awesome job Matt. I could send you a DXF of that includes Cheesy if you want?

In a way i kind of agree with Pete. I think it would be great to have the skills park over at the crit track, but possibly keep all the jumps etc over at the 4x track?

 

[aussie pete]

Could not make it to the meeting this arv but very interested in the outcome, can anyone tell me how it went?

 

[nimrodx]

Thanks for those comment RE the loop and dirt.

Mark wanted me to emphasise that these are proposals -- not actual plans at this stage (I guess that reminder is more aimed at lurkers
who are not aware of all that is happening).

That was in my mind a bit, but I just wasn't sure if it was a concern. It is the dirt jumps that were proposed are in a loop of the cri track.

I will put together some minutes and post them up.

In total, I think the meeting went pretty well. Council has some concerns, that is to be expected.
The chief concerns can be listed:
1. they would like site stability in Jube evaluated before building -- that applies particularly to the upper noob. We would have to be pretty careful about this track if
it was to go ahead.

2. If we build tracks we want some pretty solid provision to maintain them. This may mean allocating budgets from grants to
ensure that any maintenance we can't cover get's covered. I think this also means staging the build, and ensuring we can
cope or afford it. If council brings in the counters and we gradually build facillities and bring riders in from further afield, we may find
that we can score some sort of tourism as well as sports grants -- and I reckon real success in getting people in will make
us more acceptable with council. I don't think we are talking about building it all at once anyway.

We have absolutely no challenge maintaining the tracks we have. Given a few more tracks, we would still be below capacity when we get 10 people
rolling up for a couple of hours per month. If we can't do that, the only alternative is to pay -- and we can't
do that without grants and that will chew into our grant money, and our capacity to do fun stuff will be reduced.
To satisfy council, we may need to budget money for this from our grants. This money might
be able to be used otherwise if we had the volunteers to do the job properly anyway -- for example if the
maintenance is done, we pay someone to make improvements to sustainability or rideability of the trail. In other words,
a vibrant growing club will help our credibility with council and will help us achieve a lot more.

I think there is a place for a club position whose only focus is increasing membership.
In a way, this maintenance question was basically a membership criticism.
So if there are any lurkers, join up and contribute or forget nice tracks. Maybe that goes double for guys who ride past maintenance teams on maintenance days.

3. There is a bit of concern with regard to the possible location of the womens camp (like the family camp up higher) near noob tube 2.
That was not a knock back however -- that was something that needed to be looked into, and could probably be accomodated.

The order of progress now is to fix up the deed, get together the final proposal to TRC in a gpx file or such, then discuss it again,
and develop the first trail building proposal to a funder.

Before that first trail proposal, however, we need to seek funding for toilets at the bottom of the hill. Dominic will give us a hand with that.
Not sure if that could be rolled into the other proposal, though. Maybe.

Since the showgrounds proposal is on ag soc land, we need to discuss that with other people. Nothing insurmountable, and no major knock backs.

Matt

 

[Road Rage Ryan]

Hi Matt sounds very promising. I think the staged approach is definately the best. Is there a certain number of members that they would be comfortable with?

All MTB riders in Toowoomba this is your chance to be part of something amazing....

 

[MrPlow]

Wow matt (and others) this sounds great!
I reckon if we can get state government and council on side for some descent sized $$ grants I would just get world Trail in to do the lot. Or as much as possible.
These are big projects, Turkey slap took 3 years and took a lot of souls.

 

[Gripo]

all promising?

Hi Matt sounds very promising. Is there a certain number of members that they would be comfortable with?
....

In other words,
a vibrant growing club will help our credibility with council and will help us achieve a lot more.
I think there is a place for a club position whose only focus is increasing membership.
In a way, this maintenance question was basically a membership criticism.

Interesting reading, all promising......but a local reluctance to invest in our sport beyond leasing the land and giving yes/no direction?

I wouldn't take the implying of "more club membership" to deal with maintenance lightly....all sporting clubs suffer the same small % that are most active....club membership (no matter the numbers) can only do so much.

What has been done over the past several years by club membership in so far as trail building at Jubilee, both DH/XC is excellent considering most of it has been built by hand.....

Ironically to get to the stage where the sport is an integral part of the region the TRC's needs to consider a more proactive involvement.....that being local promotion of the sport/hiring trail expertise/machinery to build.....other councils in Qld, BCC/Tvlle have invested in the sport

This is a new era sport, dozing a field and turfing it isn't mountain biking......

 

[nimrodx]

the Economic Benefits of Mountain Biking

Hi All,

The Rotorua Mountain biking Club have forwarded me a copy of a report commissioned
by the Rotorua District Council by an independent consultant.

Surprise, suprise, if there are some appropriate facilities then mountain bikers can make a Council a lot of money for the area.

Despite a major and severe economic downturn in NZ in 2009, they had 101800 mountain bike visitors to the Whakarewarewa forrest
with an economic impact of $8.5 Million NZ (probably about 1.2 NZ to the Aus at the time -- not totally sure). This was just under a 16% increase on 2008 -- despite the economic conditions.

Pointing out this economic benefit, as well as the active lifestyle benefit to the region is what we need to do to support our case to
our elected representatives -- and I will be !



Kind regards

Matt

 

[Road Rage Ryan]

Matt,

Well done on getting the report. I have ridden those trails in Rotorura and they were some of the finest I have ridden. They didn't give you the name of their trail builder?

I am happy to give you a hand this year and if you need someone to help write the submissions I will put my hand up. I wrote the previous two grant applications with the help of my lovely wife. Both you and Pete have renewed my interest in land access.

 

[SCHOEY]

Also the holy grail would be to run a trail on the top side of the fireroad all the way back out to bridge St.

Just relighting the flame on this topic.

The council have been busy mulching the section just past the depression camp area on tristania trail (?). Ryans previous comment on the holy grail has got me thinking that now is the time to act on this. It would be relatively quick to make some singletrack in there now that the mulcher has gone through. I really feel we need some singletrack up the top of the hill as taste testers for newbies. While i like the idea of the newb trail near Sandstone Ridge, getting the newb there is the problem. It's a tough climb up that fireroad from the Amos Rd end to that point, & even harder from the top of the hill. I also feel that driving to the trails should always be the 2nd option. If we can modify those exit/entry points on Cheeseburger & build some singletrack back up to that top fireroad/bridle trail, we have potentially got another great loop perfect for a quick ride or for newbs to have a go at "real" mountain biking rather than ride a fireroad.

 

[aussie pete]

If we can get an official thumbs up for a trail in that area we should do it asap , as schoey said it will encourage people to ride in and out and it will add to the length of single track in jubilee also while they have the mulcher in the area would it be a good time to clear an area for a possible skills park down the bottom between Crebra and the Amos gazzebo?

 

[nimrodx]

HI All,

Not quite sure I know where you are talking about. However I think know the ball park.

I'm quite willing to go down and plot something up then ring council and have a chat and see if they might approve something relatively quickly. Anyone want to wander down on the weekend and plot it up with me?

I can foresee one problem that could/will be a show stopper.

Has a meeting to renew and finalise the deed been conducted with council yet? When is it scheduled?

We were told in the meeting in November that was the first step before any trail building.

Anyone got an update on that?

Kind regards

Matt

 

[aussie pete]

Should be able to go for a walk on the weekend and see what can be done, as far as the deed goes I don't know where thats at, probably best giving one of the execs a nudge.

 

[J.R.]

An upper loop incorporating cheeseburger would be a lot of fun and no doubt would encourage a lot of beginner riders. As far as getting from the lower bridle trail up to the top one, there is an old walking track that the council has abandoned that may be worth a look. No doubt you guys are probably aware of this, but I though it was worth mentioning. Fifteen to twenty odd years ago you used to be able to walk from the creek crossing (past the depression camp ) up a series of switch backs, past a water fall, over a bridge and out onto the top bridle trail. I think the council closed it for safety reasons. I'm sure the flooding has damaged a lot of it and it would be over grown, however from what I remember the track was pretty well benched in so the bones of the track may still be there. Since the flood the lower entrance is unreckonizable so the best option would be to approach it from the top. If you follow Jellicoe street to the end then walk through the clearing towards the scrub while vearing to the left you should find the bridge if it is still there. Anyhow thought it was worth a mention.

 

[SCHOEY]

JR, I remember that walking trail. Seems like the council does not want to maintain any trails & would prefer to close them. The waterfall trail your talking about, suspension bridge & more recently picnic point. Im sure there is probably other on the local are too. I'd be interested to hear how the council made these decisions & whether the community had any say.

 

[Mashpotato Muscles]

Hi Chaps
What time on the weekend are you checking the area for the new track. I know where the waterfall track is/was - rode down it before the flood so can point it out. Suspect it is pretty overgrown but the benching still might be there.
MM
PS bridge isn't there - TRC removed it