Trail closures

[old_bashturd]

Let me preface these comments with the following. I do not endorse illegal trail building in the park. I love what Amy and the rest of the Patapsco personnel, along with MORE, do on a daily basis to provide the riders in the area with one of the nicest riding areas in the state. That being said, I discovered on my loop this morning that the Renegade, Not your Moma’s and the “BoardWalk” trails have been closed. All these trails are on the Belmont, or “Farmloop” side in HO CO. All traces of the trails are gone. I was under the impression, as were others that these trails were on private property. Apparently they were not. I completely understand the Parks policy on illegal trail building, but I have to say, closing these trails, and leaving the other trail, which was built illegally as well, is a bit mystifying. The Belmont loop is notorious for being wet and muddy when conditions in the rest of the park are dry. These 3 trails allowed the Belmont loop to be ridable when conditions otherwise warrant avoiding Belmont completely. The trails that were left open become a bloody mess when it’s the least bit muddy. Not to mention the stream crossing which has become extremely rutted and eroded. Those 3 trails took the pressure off the existing trail, which offers an easier alternative to less experienced riders. Those 3 trails offered a dry and more challanging route through Belmont. As far as the skinnys and log bridges, they were low to the ground. There was nothing IMHO on those trails that was the least bit dangerous, unlike the gap jumps on Lewis & Clark. Other illegal trails discovered in the last few years have been left open, and these trails have turned out to be very sustainable.
I’m not saying the park was wrong to tear these out, I just wish they would have left these in, and closed the other routes that are much more problematic.

[crashmore]

Are we certain it was the park who closed them?

[old_bashturd]

I'm Assuming. I could be wrong.

[urbaindk]

I agree completely. These trails, however illegally built, provided a great benefit in that they avoided all that muddy mess, plus it was fun as h-e-double hockeysticks. Stupid, stupid, stupid.

I'm sure Crawford will pipe up with more details on who did what... He knows things.

[kevin]

Yeah, Eric has the info and I'm sure will weigh in soon.

The park did take the trails out, that much I know for certain. They were pretty much completely on Park land as it turns out and since they were illegally built the park removed them.

I understand your opinion that these new illegal trails were better than the old illegal trail (I thought they were more fun too). But, parts of the new illegal trail were built in areas that would have ended up looking like the old trail if it saw all the traffic that the old trail saw (my opinion).

Kevin

[BikerMiker]

Those trails were poorly built from a technical standpoint. 'Fun' and 'sustainable' are different. I gotta tell ya, I wasn't jumping up and down happy that these trails were there, especially if we were going to have to maintain them.

They are on park land. They come out. This type of stuff doesn't help our case with DNR, that's for sure. We may be able to chalk it up to a simple mistake as the builder is known and he said that he got approval. Too bad he didn't know where he was.

Trails should not be built by random people who want to build trails. Same with roads. If you are going to saddle the mtn bike community with future maintenance, you better bring some people in with you or else you'll spend your life fixing that trail.

Eric has the full story. But, Amy found it and the park took it out.

I get a bit militant about people building trail. Just ask anyone who's been at a trail maintenance day with me... The good news is that I've thrown in to help others learn the stuff that IMBA taught us a few years ago for 2009 if things go well...

Let's all disagree on the trail situation. You can't compare it to the Belmont route cuz that ain't real trail either. It's all legacy stuff that shouldn't be there either. On private property.

mk

[urbaindk]

So could there be an option that reroutes the trail onto park land that could be sustainable? I was under the impression that there was a big gap in the park property that made this impossible. Now they're saying that this section was on park land? I'm confused.

[BikerMiker]

Well, Belmont Rd is not owned by the park so that makes it difficult right there!

There is a lot of field drainage over there so there would have to be some more boardwalking or a lot of stone brought in. The section down to the water (both of them on that trail) are very difficult to deal with. Water crossing is a bad idea unless you can't avoid it.

Amy with DNR is pretty dedicated in terms of her projects and funding for those projects. I'm not EXACTLY sure, but I think Eric has allowed Amy to dictate a lot of the work that MORE does in Patapsco as opposed to how things used to happen years ago when Amy and Jen had different positions and the situation was different. I'm not saying things are worse or better now, just different.

We could have 3-4 more trail crews working out there when you look at all the work we could be doing out there. Amy has settled in to the grants work and she is REALLY kicking butt on major projects in Patapsco and that is rad. One tack Eric could take is to allow Amy to plow ahead on her stuff and dedicate the MORE resources on other projects or parallel projects or whatever. I'm not the liaison but there are other options regarding dealing with these specific issues.

For YOU though, you could sit down with me or Eric and come up with some potential solutions then move forward with some re-routes over there by Belmont. I'd be happy to throw a few hours your way, of course!

Let me know.

Long-winded as usual...

mk

[atldc9]

Serious bummer!! Rode out of Rockburn today, with ideal conditions. All the trails were frozen solid, most of the leaves have blown away or worn down to mulch, and the trails were PERFECT!! Fast and hard. Then we came to do the notyourmammas or whatever you call it, and bam- it was gone completely.

It seems to me the park staff must have put a lot of effort to remove the trail. It is an unfortunate situation, not only to lose the trail, but to waist the park's time to remove it.

[escatmore]

I am certain the park closed the renegade and not your momma's trail.

I am certain those trails were nearly 100% on park land ( my educated guess is maybe 10-20 feet was on private property, still working on confirming that ).

I do not know what the boardwalk trails are. Is that another name for the renegade and not your momma's trails? Or something else that has been removed?

but I have to say, closing these trails, and leaving the other trail, which was built illegally as well, is a bit mystifying.

What other trail? The original line that goes through the field with all the freshly planted trees? That trail is not illegal. It is unmaintained, a very important distinction explained a little more below.

There is currently no option that would allow the park to put in a sustainable trail that travels from the small lot on Landing where Morning Choice comes out and Rockburn Branch trail. The reason is you would have to cross private property. You could do it on the side leading to Belmont Woods Road but not from the road to Rockburn Branch. There is an unmaintained trail there that has existed for eons, but it's unmaintained. Unmaintained means it's not illegal, means it's open, means we can't work on it, means it cannot be rerouted to a more sustainable line. I will continue my efforts to get the landowners and the park to come to some agreement to allow it to become maintained. Until then, it's stuck in limbo.

I'm still working on this. Stay tuned.

eric

[escatmore]

Well, Belmont Rd is not owned by the park so that makes it difficult right there!

There is a lot of field drainage over there so there would have to be some more boardwalking or a lot of stone brought in. The section down to the water (both of them on that trail) are very difficult to deal with. Water crossing is a bad idea unless you can't avoid it.

Amy with DNR is pretty dedicated in terms of her projects and funding for those projects. I'm not EXACTLY sure, but I think Eric has allowed Amy to dictate a lot of the work that MORE does in Patapsco as opposed to how things used to happen years ago when Amy and Jen had different positions and the situation was different. I'm not saying things are worse or better now, just different.

We could have 3-4 more trail crews working out there when you look at all the work we could be doing out there. Amy has settled in to the grants work and she is REALLY kicking butt on major projects in Patapsco and that is rad. One tack Eric could take is to allow Amy to plow ahead on her stuff and dedicate the MORE resources on other projects or parallel projects or whatever. I'm not the liaison but there are other options regarding dealing with these specific issues.

For YOU though, you could sit down with me or Eric and come up with some potential solutions then move forward with some re-routes over there by Belmont. I'd be happy to throw a few hours your way, of course!

Let me know.

Long-winded as usual...

mk

Careful or I'll red dot your silly @ss.

eric

[old_bashturd]

I do not know what the boardwalk trails are. Is that another name for the renegade and not your momma's trails? Or something else that has been removed?



What other trail? The original line that goes through the field with all the freshly planted trees? That trail is not illegal. It is unmaintained, a very important distinction explained a little more below.eric

The Boardwalk was right near the crossing at Belmont road, after Not Your Momma's.

The other trail picks up on the left, after crossing the stream from the old horse farm, heading toward Belmont. Its been there for about 3 years or so.

[escatmore]

The Boardwalk was right near the crossing at Belmont road, after Not Your Momma's.

The other trail picks up on the left, after crossing the stream from the old horse farm, heading toward Belmont. Its been there for about 3 years or so.

My educated guess is she saw it as an extension of those trails and not of the original line. And if she did, then she would have wiped it out as well.

eric

[laxdad]

it sucks to be you guys. now the shoe is on the other foot.

[atlantis]

I vaguely recall her mentioning something about this at the last trail day, but I may also be on post-ride crack.

Patapsco is a great place and I wish I rode it more. And it has a ton of future potential and I think Amy is looking forward to working with us to make it an even better place to ride.

[jabberwocky]

it sucks to be you guys. now the shoe is on the other foot.Don't make me run you over again. ;)

[Dr Phil mmkay]

Don't make me run you over again. ;)

Sure, but no core-samples of thigh, please. Just hearing about it makes me all queezy. :p

[ExigeS]

I am confused… a few weeks ago I was on a group ride at Patapsco and a rider (I can’t remember his name but he rides a Jykell) said he helped build those trails and that they were on private land so the park service could not touch them. He told me about all the work he put into it and how the people who own the land were OK with it being there. I feel bad if it was just a miscalculation of private vs. park property. With that said maybe he can get approval from the private property owners to truly build the trail again the there property.

[urbaindk]

For YOU though, you could sit down with me or Eric and come up with some potential solutions then move forward with some re-routes over there by Belmont. I'd be happy to throw a few hours your way, of course!


Sounds like we need to let Eric (try to) do his job fostering some sort of agreement between the park and the landowners to allow maintenance first, then we can talk. But yeah, that's a good idea when/if the time comes.

[laxdad]

Don't make me run you over again. ;)

you got me.

[leroy]

anyone get out? What's up with the dirt? I suspect things are a little iffy. ????

[old_bashturd]

This morning trails were frozen. As I was comming out, around 11, they were starting to thaw. Overall, not bad, but there are going to be some soft spots and the thin layer of mud on some sections.