The Hidden Costs of Mountain Biking

I see you are on an anti bike campaign. What are the ethics of using your position as a member of the press to reinforce your personal agenda? Your arguments against bikes on the trail have a couple of holes and are misleading. Studies have shown that bikes, hikers and horses do about the same amount of damage, so it is just as valid to suggest eliminating hikers instead of bikes. I think the picture showing the illegal cut back is from hikers not bikers. ( I will have to investigate, but I have never seen this cut back on my bike). The trail maintenance cost you declare to be prohibitive is more than covered. There are now many volunteers maintaining the trails and many are mountain bikers. Mother nature will cause way more damage than any user group. Are you going to regulate Mother Nature next? If the plants you are showing are that endangered the trails should be shut down. Otherwise they are unfortunate victims of all users. Are you sure no dogs or people or horses have ever toppled over any vegetation? Once again I must point out that you are causing problems for multi use not solving them. Don't make me go out documenting hikers and the damage they do, or start finding the hikers that have sabotaged the trail attempting to hurt and maim people on bikes. Please figure out a more productive approach.

I haven't seen this week's hardcopy edition yet, but the main problem I have with this online article is as of Thu nite, I can't tell whether this is a news piece, a part of the opinion section, Voices, or Ray's column (it doesn't seem to be accesible from any of those links, I got here from an e-mail link).

If this is an opinion piece, then I'd ask the editors to identify it as such and leave it at that. But if this is a news article, then I think its rather one-sided. It fails my test when I ask ... "Does it help me understand all sides of an issue?".

Right on Ray!

Agree that Ray is on an obvious campaign to eliminate mountain bikes - from the front country trails at least. How can we keep trails available to responsible users, and restrict the abusers (whether on bike, foot, horse, etc)?? I recall that on Mt. Tam in Marin County they would give out painful traffic tickets to abusers. I love the front country trails - and use them responsibly and politely on horseback, foot, and bike. Many of us are neighbors, taxpayers, and MTF donors/volunteers who do! There are ways to share them, and ways to use them responsibly. The answer is to find ways to deal with the abusers (whether on foot, horseback or bike), not discriminate against a whole class of valid users. I am offended by Ford's use of the Independent's news pages to push a one-sided agenda without giving equal time to the other side of the opinion "fence". Signed, ex-Ford fan.

To Ray and others, I should clarify my concern is a journalistic one. The power of the pen is well known and I don't doubt their are some Indy fans who might read a non-opinion article and be swayed to one side (sub-consciously or not) if multiple voices aren't heard in the article. After all, isn't fairness one of the things that differentiates a community newspaper from a blog?

This is not to say that there isn't any value in the article or that it shouldn't have been written. On the contrary, I thought it was interesting to read Sovich views. It helps me understand the spectrum of trail users concerns. And I'm very glad someone is writing about them. Nevertheless, the presentation concerns me.

At a minimum, I would have preferred to see a short introduction that states the article looks at a unique viewpoint among many different and strongly held opinions before diving in. Pedantic? I believe its needed for a non-opinion piece.

An interesting alternative would be a series where each article focuses on a particular viewpoint. The first article could be an introduction/primer to trail use issues followed by the viewpoint articles (the article on Sovich would easily fit in). Obviously this would be a tricky series to write and I'd hope it would be written in a way that could bring sides together rather than factionalizing them further. But this would be a great vehicle because it implies there was consideration by the author for analysis and even-handedness prior to the articles appearing.

However, if one claims that this has all been done before, and/or Sovich's opinions are so unique that they deserve its own article, then I would say fine, print it, but put it in the opinion area. The same goes for any other particular trail use viewpoint.

For a well rounded perspective on the issue of trail usage in the frontcountry, it would be good to hear from one or more of the above commentary sources in an article in defense of their point of view, philosophy, and findings to their proposed studies. I don't necessarily think that Ray needs to publish a myriad of articles simultaneously, but rather develop the issue over time...which is what one would assuming is going to happen.
anxious to read more on this topic...

If you don't want people to be emotional you need to be much more responsible about how you write things. You have attacked a user group and then play it off like you were just trying to explore issues to get people to talk to resolve issues. If you don't want fire don't light the match.

The switch backs that you referred to are not primarily from bikes. From what I saw they are from foot travel. That would not be a good alternative path for a bike. For one it is just as easy to continue down the trail, and two if you did not take the first one the second one would be impossible to turn into. So how did it get there? The ironic thing is that you did not include a picture of the switch back a little further down the trail or discuss why it is there. I witnessed a dog come down the cut back and slide dirt down it. It is not a cut that a bike would take as it would jam you into the wall. Did Frank have his dog on a 6 foot leash and keep it on the trail? My guess is the dog ran free on and off the trail and used the cut back that you are blaming solely on bikes. It might have even toppled the lily too. If a bike hit those lilies it must have been from a crash. Bikes don't just wonder around off trail like a dog, horse or hiker can and do.Can you do an article on the costs of dogs on the trails.

In general the trail is in amazing condition. If it is a little wider because of bikes that is a good thing as it gives room to safely pass other users and keeps the vegetation back so we do not have to spend money grooming the trail as much. I am not seeing you or Frank point out all the broken poison oak twigs.

My concern with any user pushing against other users is that it then becomes more tedious and annoying and expensive to manage the users than to maintain the trails. If you really don't want to chase bikes off the trails then stop pushing. Do you really want trail cops? Right now it is a great place for many people. Let's leave it at that and use our energy for maintenance and education. And let the Front Country Task Force do their thing.