Trail access. Is it a club responsibility?

[scratchy]

I would be interested to hear of anyones local experiences. Does a club have a certain social responsibilty to it's riders to let them know of pending access issues and how they could potentially contribute to help get trail access? Even if the area is not used for racing but rather social riding, should the club be involved or at least make the effort to inform it's members on how they can get involved?

(Sorry about the bad Engrish in the poll, I don't know how to edit it!)

[Cletus]

i dont think it should be a clubs responsibility to inform members about trail closeure or accsess issuses, though i think it is a good idea for the clubs to know about there local trails and what is happening with them so if you ask they can let you know. but as most trails are not owned my mtb clubs i dont think they should be held accountable for trail issuse as for most of the time it would be well out of there hands. i think trail access should be the responsibility of the riders that use the trails and should be looked after by those people.
i hope i hav'nt missed your point?

[sammydog]

Were going through this at the moment. Personally think that a to a certain degee the clubs do have a role to play, but, the land managers (in our case NPWS) don't see the clubs as representing all riders.

Unfortunately this is probably true, a Mtb club will only be a small percentage of the total riders in an area.

I think the biggest responsibility falls with individual riders to do the right thing in the first place, so you minimise the chances of there being trail access issues. What's been shown at Glenrock is that even when trail access is being threatened, a lot of riders just don't care and continue causing problems and carrying on with the activities that have got us where we are now..

Having said all that, yes a club should be involved, and should do everything it can to alert people to the problem and go about solving it. This is however no excuse for inividuls to sit on there ass and do nothing, if there is an issue, get involved in finding a solution.

[thecat]

No, it's the riders responsability to keep informed and help out with trail access issues.

The easiest way to do this is to join a club.

But you have to remember that club officials are volunteers who have a heap of other stuff they need to do, work that actually pays money. It maybe that an issue you think is really important isn't to them, or maybe they don't even know about it.

Now if you are a member of the club then all the issues will be discussed at their monthly meeting. To be informed you have to turn up. If the issue isn't being discussed then you have your chance to bring it to their attention under the general business section of the meeting.

Club officials represent their members, but it is only through the formal monthly meeting that you can have your views noted down and acted upon.

So in short, if there is a known issue it will the brought up at the monthly meeting. It is up to the riders to attend these to stay informed. I'm certainly not going to personally phone all our members in my spare time to make sure they all know whats going on.

If you have an issue, again it it your responsibility to bring it up at the monthly meeting

[scratchy]

Having said all that, yes a club should be involved, and should do everything it can to alert people to the problem and go about solving it. This is however no excuse for inividuls to sit on there ass and do nothing, if there is an issue, get involved in finding a solution.

My issue is actually with the club sitting on their asses and doing nothing. I agree with thecat, ppl should join a club. But what if the club doesn't consider trail access or alerting members to trail access issues as part of it's role. Do you agree?

[thecat]

But what if the club doesn't consider trail access or alerting members to trail access issues as part of it's role. Do you agree?

Again, go to the monthly meeting and bring it up. Move a motion on a course of action. If the motion is Moved, Seconded and Passed by vote the club has a resposibilty to act.

It may be that the club asks you to get more involved by following through on that course of action, acting as a representative to the club.

Sometimes that's all you can do

[sammydog]

Thats exactly right, go to a club meeting and bring it up. In never ceases to amaze me the number of people who bitch about the way a club is run, but never turn up to a meeting to voice their opinion.

HMBA has gotten involved in trail access up here by have a person involved in the GlenrockTrailAlliance. I basically report back to the club each month on an issues that have come up.

Thats about where the club involvement stops at the moment. We will be encouraging all members to put a submission into the NPWS when the time comes, but at that point the onus really will be on the individual.

As I said before though, the inidividual rider needs to have a real good look at the implications of their actions while riding. They should contact the relevant land owners to find out the issues first hand. Sadly the vast majority don't.

Scratchy, its interesting you say the club is sitting on their asses doing nothing, what are the rest of the Mtb community doing?

[R33F]

So in short, if there is a known issue it will the brought up at the monthly meeting. It is up to the riders to attend these to stay informed. I'm certainly not going to personally phone all our members in my spare time to make sure they all know whats going on.

Is there not "minutes" of the meetings taken ? Is there not a newsletter / email distributed to members who cant attend ?

I totally agree that its is the riders responsibility to communicate with the club, but it is also in the clubs best interest to let all riders know trail information, members or not.

[bazza]

i think it is to those IN and actively involved in the club! its not a responsiblity to the community. if you ride all the time at local tracks and what not than go and get a club membership!

[spinner]

I think it is a clubs best interest to represent not only its members , but the wider riding community. When it comes to trail access and dealing with land managers , a club will always have more credibility than say a couple of individuals. I'm sure the land managers would prefer to deal with a larger group of riders with designated representatives , rather than a few random guys asking if they can ride or build trails in a certain place.

If your club wants to steer clear of these issues , then I think thats pretty lame , but theres no law saying they have to. Join another club or start your own !

I'm involved with a proposal for trail access at the moment and I have to say , without the clubs involvement , we would not have gotten this far as a group of individuals.

[thecat]

I think it is a clubs best interest to represent not only its members , but the wider riding community.

The problem is that in many instances clubs have gone in and done deals with land managers but when they take those deals back to the "wider riding community" they get "Ah, stuff you, we'll do what we want. Why should be compremise. You can't stop us."

The land manager then see riders breaking the rules and get jacked off at the club. Time and time again if riders are doing the wrong thing it's the local club that gets the blame.

I can't claim to represent anyone but the members of my club. Sure I try to keep trails open for everyone but at the end of the day the club members are the only ones I have even limited control over.

[sammydog]

The problem is that in many instances clubs have gone in and done deals with land managers but when they take those deals back to the "wider riding community" they get "Ah, stuff you, we'll do what we want. Why should be compremise. You can't stop us."

The land manager then see riders breaking the rules and get jacked off at the club. Time and time again if riders are doing the wrong thing it's the local club that gets the blame.

And that is the crux of the problem. We were told in no uncertain terms by the NPWS that they wouldn't see us as representing the entire Mtb community. And the thing is, it is very hard to work toward a mutual solution while riders ar continuing to do as they please.

Its fine to point the finger at clubs for not appearing to be proactive or whatever, but the real problem lies in the attitudes of the Mtb community toward riding areas on land that is managed by someone else. If these attitutes and behaviours weren't out of control, then perhaps there wouldn't be a need for anyone, be it clubs or individuals, to fight for trail access and clean up the current mess.

[Dumbellina]

I have thought about this for a little while. I think the distinction between clubs roles versus other's roles needs explaining.

A sporting club is primarily there to provide sporting activities for its members - whether that is racing events and facilities, or social event or even charity events. It is up to its members to decide what the club does and how it does it - look at the objects of association or constitution of your club.

Second in Australia trail access rights are coordinated through MTBA. MTBA is essentially the peak body of MTB clubs. They organise national level competition and set the rules for state and club racing activities. In the US they have the International MTB Association (IMBA), which coordinates trail access issues and holds events celebrating trail access. It does not organise or hold races. We don't have an equivalent of IMBA and Cycling Australia were and are hopeless at administering MTB racing, so we have a hybrid in the form of MTBA.

Thirdly land managers like to deal with organised groups. A key component of negotiation is being able to get commitment from the other party. As Sammy's saying NPWS wants to get commitment from a body that more broadly represents MTB users so it can get them in turn to commit to the regulated use of MTBs. So if the club does not represent the user group - for example Western Sydney MTB Club would not represent all or even most users of the Royal NP - the land manager needs some other body to negotiate with. It is inefficient to negotiate with every user or group of users, so some form of representative group must be used.

I argue that in the absence of anything else that group, subject to the wishes of its members, should be the local club. It has a formal structure and an existing network of riders (including non-members) through which to communicate and seek feedback and advice.

This means that MTB users should consider membership of a club even if they don't race - and clubs offer social membership rates for these members.

[schmackster]

Does a club have a certain social responsibilty to it's riders to let them know of pending access issues and how they could potentially contribute to help get trail access?
IMHO everybody should be responsible for knowing about trail access issues.

The problem is that trail advocacy in Australia is still in it's infancy and we are looking to IMBA for help and to learn from their experiences but our situation in Australia is slightly different than that of the US. Namely more tracks and less riders willing to do the trail building and maintenance. In the US where population density is much higher it is easier to get 100 people to a trail maintenance day. Has anyone ever got more than about 10 people to a maintenance day? I struggle to get 2 or 3 and sometimes end up out there by myself!

The other problem is that clubs are administered by volunteers and trail access issues are long, drawn out affairs. A ot of people can't be bothered dealing with the bureaucrats.

Despite all of this I believe that there is a bright future if we hold up IMBA as an example to land managers of what can be done and learn from their experiences. It is a slow process and MTBA bringing IMBA people out to talk to land managers and teach riders how to build sustainable trails can only help speed up this process.

The only problem is trying to keep the enthusiasm up when you are dealing with all the bureaucrats.

[chips_with_everything]

While I do think clubs should take responsibility for communicating access issues and ensuring their members cause a minimum of impact... the same applies to everyone.

I think ALL MTB enthusiasts ought to join MTBA, as a recreational member if you don't choose to belong to a club, all should ride responsibly, and all should be involved in access campaigning.

Yes in order to negotiate you need an organization, and that's going to be MTBA and for those who belong... clubs.

However in order to get messages through to land managers and politicians we also need arms-and-legs making sure that pollies and land managers know we are a significant number of people; and we want to ride in such-and-such a place; and that we aren't going to stuff it up.

We cannot rely on other people to do the work for us.Achieving and maintaining access is a long process so we need lots of worker bees with email, phones and pens in order to avoid burnout.

[demo man]

one of the great things about Canberra is that there are so many members of the club.

CORC is australias largest mountain bike club by quite a gap.

this means that when talking to the powers that be in terms of trail advocacy we have much more chance of getting what we are asking for.

CORC does way more than a lot of people think we do for trail advocacy, problem is our advocacy team is made up of 4 XC riders. i have just joined said team, and two other blokes have put their hand up to help for the DH stuff too, which is great.

it always annoys me how many people bitch about clubs not doing anything for trail issues, it's bad anough when their right, the club isn't doing anything, but then it's worse when they don't volunteer but still complain to the volunteers of the club, and then it's worse again when the club is doing work but they just don't know about it, and worst when the club is doing stuff, and they complain about it taking too long and STILL DON'T HELP!


i think that a mountain biking clun should be involved in all types of riding that it's MEMBERS are interested in. while it's all good to go of and say that the club doesn't do enough for 4X or DH and so they don't become a member, all that means is that there is 1 less member asking for more DH/4X events and trails.
in terms of gaining trail access, well i do think that if you ride a bike on trails then it's your issue. but, having said that, a club with a large membership base has way more chance of getting new trails than a few individuals who think itwould be cool to build a mad huck on that hill over there. that's about as obvious as a pink elephant in the middle of the city centerwould be.

so, moral of the story is: if you want to keep riding trails you should be a financial member of your local club, and be helping them out however you can.

how complicated riding your bike can get....

[chips_with_everything]

One other access lobbying option is through bicycle user groups.

It's not very specific to MTBing, but in some ways that's good. Our local bug, BM bug, certainly is active on the subject of trail access.

Furthermore I think this is good for perception. Some areas are sensitive, where the more 'sporting' aspects of MTBing would not be acceptable. If the appropriate access need is management tracks, and the modality is more like MTB touring than anything else, then the BUG is possibly the way to go.

This way the perception is of Mom and Pop with panniers and a tent, or people doing epics, rather than skidding around corners and frightening walkers.

[demo man]

bugs are good for trails that you don't want to race.

[Turner_rider]

A toughie....

IMO your view on this topic is going to be dependent on a lot of factors ie where you are, the style of riding you doing, current access issues, active club member, competitive rider etc etc etc.

In my part of the world IMO trail access isn't a real big issue compared to other parts of the country and if anything, more areas have become available to riding than been restricted. As with everywhere else in the world there are always a lot more people telling you what/how you should do things without lifting a finger to help. Over time I've learnt to ignore them and instead focus on the critical mass who do make things happen.

If access is critical to the running or existance of a club then yes there is a responisibility, but if there is little or no impact then it's difficult to justify spending a lot of time on the issue.