How naive could I have been? I thought the upcoming "listening sessions" being staged by the Interior Department were intended to help DOI and Park Service officials identify "signature projects" that would go towards celebrating the Park Service's centennial in 2016.
Others, though, see these sessions as an opening to pressure the Park Service to allow more recreational opportunities in the parks, opportunities that might not be in the best interests of the parks.
Doubt me? Check out this release from the International Mountain Bicycling Association.
IMBA
urges mountain bikers to attend the listening sessions, in order to strengthen
the productive relationship that
mountain bicyclists have forged with the NPS, and to ask for increased bicycling
opportunities in national parks.
IMBA likes to tout its "productive relationship" with the Park Service. I guess how productive that relationship is depends on how you measure productivity.
Does having to dodge mountain bikes on hiking trails make you want to head out for an afternoon hike? That's the situation at the Big South Fork National River and Recreation Area. Under an experimental plan launched last summer hikers get the area's trails exclusively on weekends, and have to share them with mountain bikers on weekdays. Who wins in a collision between mountain bikers and a hiker?
I've long been uneasy with IMBA's desire to open the parks to mountain biking. As I've previously pointed out, there are hundreds of miles, if not thousands, of already existing dirt roads that mountain bikers can access in the parks. And I have no problem with that. My concern is what's already happening at Big South Fork, and what could happen down the road at other parks.
As I've already reported, IMBA has its sights set on cutting single-track trails in the parks for mountain bikes, trails that not only leave little room to avoid collisions between hikers and bikers but also would increasingly slice up the parks' landscape.
And now the group figures the centennial listening sessions are the perfect opportunity to push its agenda. In its release, IMBA even provides "talking points" mountain bikers can use at the listening sessions.
Why do we need mountain-biking single track trails in the national parks? Aren't there enough miles of trails on other public lands, lands that have different management missions than NPS lands? Must every recreational opportunity on U.S. Forest Service and U.S. Bureau of Land Management lands be permitted in the national parks?
I would say no.
Comments
Thought you might like the follow-up on your "dodging bikes" comment at Big South Fork. I hate to disappoint you, but mountain biking was apparently a success:
Shared-use Big South Fork trail deemed a success
By Morgan Simmons (Contact)
Sunday, October 7, 2007
An experiment to permit mountain biking on a trail in the Big South Fork National River and Recreation Area previously designated as hiking-only has come to a close, and the result is good news for mountain bikers.
For the past year, the National Park Service has used the Grand Gap Loop Trail to test a shared-use management strategy that allows mountain biking and hiking during the week, and only hiking on weekends.
Big South Fork spokesman Steve Seven said the pilot project brought no negative comments from hikers, and that the only complaint from mountain bikers was that the trail was closed to them on weekends.
“Based on the feedback we received from hikers and mountain bikers, we made the decision that the testing phase was over, and that the project was successful,” Seven said.
The Grand Gap Loop Trail, in the heart of the 125,000-acre park, is seven miles long and features numerous dramatic overlooks into the main river gorge. The trail is single-track, and rated moderately difficult for mountain biking. Some sections of the Grand Gap Look trail skirt the edge of the bluff line, while others pass through boulder gardens and rock shelters carved out of sandstone.
While “user-sharing” trails are not new — the Tsali Trail system along North Carolina’s Fontana Lake designates alternate days for mountain biking and horseback riding — this is the first time the Big South Fork has put the concept to the test.
Now that Grand Gap Loop has passed the experimental phase, managers at Big South Fork can designate more trails as shared use between mountain bikers and hikers as directed in the park’s new general management plan.
One candidate for inclusion into the time-share system is an extension off the Grand Gap Loop that leads to Station Camp, along the Big South Fork River. When this trail opens, the seven-mile Grand Gap would expand into a 16-mile loop, with 13 miles of that being single-track.
The park’s general management plan also calls for portions of the John Muir Trail and the Rock Creek Trail to be opened to hiking and mountain biking on a time-share basis.
Big South Fork is one of the few national park units that allow mountain biking. Congress authorized the park in 1974 to protect the Big South Fork and its tributaries and to provide a variety of recreation opportunities ranging from hunting and fishing to hiking and horseback riding.
A key player in promoting mountain biking at Big South Fork is the Big South Fork Mountain Bike Club. In addition to building and maintaining mountain bike trails, the club patrols the park to aid and assist mountain bikers. The Big South Fork has about 400 miles of trail overall — 130 miles for hiking, and about 160 miles of multiple-use trails that allow horseback riding, hiking and mountain biking.
In addition, the park has three dedicated mountain-biking trails (open to mountain bikers and hikers but not horseback riders) near the Bandy Creek Visitors Center. These are the Collier Ridge Trail, West Bandy Trail and the Duncan Hollow Loop.
The park’s new management plan calls for the mountain-biking trail system to expand from eight to 24 miles, with the potential for more trails in the future.
Joe Cross, president of the Big South Fork Mountain Bike Club, said he is not surprised that the Grand Gap Loop experimental project received such positive feedback from mountain bikers and hikers alike.
“Most hard-core hikers are bikers, anyway,” Cross said.
Morgan Simmons may be reached at 865-342-6321.
I think that this is a great success story. I believe that it is long overdue for the Park Service to realize that hikers and equestrians are not the only valid trail users in the parks. What many of those who would like to lump cyclists in with ORV users do not realize is that there is a much clearer distinction between motorized and non-motorized recreation, rather than mechanized versus non-mechanized. It was stated in the above article that “most hard-core hikers are bikers, anyway,” yet I would flip this around to say that most mountain bikers are hikers and understand well the need to co-exist on the trails together. Those of us who like to ride on trails do so primarily to visit our favorite places and enjoy the scenery and natural elements that are found there, albeit via our bicycles.