Everything is relative. When you're talking about forests and heavily wooded areas, the subject becomes more difficult as opposed to desert terrain. Also, biking on fire stops and the more technical truck trails is different than sticking to exclusive MTB/hiking/equestrian trails. My point is mountain biking is an improviser's and an explorer's sport. If a rider is unhappy with the crowding or general state of police of a certain trail, maybe it is time to find a new one.
Maybe we should take a page from the surfers handbook. These are my local trails and you can't ride here or you cut me off, time to fight.....
Shuttle hate? Shuttle congratulate! =P, what I offer to this thread is nothing someone hasn't already said... we as a community must adapt. The sport has evolved and so should our responsibilities as a community. It will be difficult to change the behavior of others but we can try and change our own... I hate trailwork with a fricken passion I would much rather be riding the trails than repairing them. But over past couple of years I have been helping out a little more and even organizing my own trail work days. I would never have thought to do this when i first started riding in 1995, hell i wouldn't have thought to do this just 5 years ago because I am selfish bastard AND i don't mind riding torn up trails as it's more challenging at times. But I adapted and I am a little salty that I did#-o.
And I started out as a road rider, CROSS COUNTRY hiker and BACKCOUNTRY skier who had little to no use for trails. But eventually I got into mountain biking and saw the need for trail maintenance, and even the opportunity of evolving the protocol to work better for bikes, so here I am. Salty, too, and super old (according to Mo), but who better than mountain bikers to take care of our trails?
In the texas TMBRA series there are points given out for trail maintenance. I think the points given out are virtually equivalent to getting a podium at a race. This encourages all the racers to participate in trail work to get those points. Not sure if this is common or a TMBRA thing.
It doesn't make sense to me the Forest Service issued permits to allow private companies to operate high volume shuttle service during weekends at the San Gabriels. Hikers (sometimes bus loads) love to hike up sunset (narrow and exposed) during peak weekend hiking hours (7am-12pm) The Downhillers due to scheduling by shuttle companies also operate at the same time frame. Sooner or later, these two force of nature lovers may collide! Conditions are over grown in some cases, blind corners, exposure, windy, rocky and lots of jumps. Want to get an idea how popular these trails are with hikers? Yelp will give you an idea. I've rarely seen any mountain biker with downhill equipment on fire roads, it's always the narrow trails. Heck, I ride the same narrow trails too. I love it. I rarely see hikers on fireroads too! Don't get me wrong, I think we should all be able to share the San Gabriels together.
Wasn't going to post anymore in this thread...but I do think the ForestService permitting questions on the shuttle services are interesting. Wonder just how much monitoring of the situation up there has been done by the FS? Those lower sections are some very popular hiking trails, by a very diverse group of hikers.
now I know to avoid this thread. That comment will surely be followed by something that has been seen way to many times
So we got hundreds of shuttle (lift) riders blowing out the trails in just a few days up at Big Bear. Now let's celebrate the installation of pavers! Woo Hoo! Let's pave the trails and deny we cause any damage!!!! http://www.socaltrailriders.org/forum/general-discussion/68176-more-pavers-being-installed-snow-summit.html Yes I am fully aware that this is a purpose-built scenario and that this is expected at bike parks. What it shows is the damage than can be wrought on ANY trail system by a systematic implementation of a profit-driven shuttle service that operates at the expense of other trail users.
Rossage.."So we got hundreds of shuttle (lift) riders blowing out the trails in just a few days up at Big Bear." Its a great example of what our non-lift service trails are subjected to over time, and how the best of intentions and design still rely on decent soil quality to be sustainable. Without numbers, it's hard to know how much additional impact professional shuttle services are putting on general use National Forest trails. Those riders could certainly drive their own vehicles as many do, so the question is how many "additional" riders are hitting a trail annually and is there a perceived entitlement going along with the fact that they've paid for the experience. The other question I have is whether or not the FS requires the pro shuttle services to mitigate any additional damage, or just leaves it up to volunteers. "Shuttle-Runs" website says they pay a 5% fee to the Forest Service in order to operate their business. That wouldn't seem to be enough to accomplish any substantial work. Snow Summit has to pay for it's own maintenance or lose riders due to poor trail quality. The general public doesn't have that option and would just suffer the consequences of increased damage, if in fact it is occurring, due to professional shuttle services.
