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Bike Trails Building Community

Mountain biking
Riders navigate a bridge on the Jaw Trail within the Kingdom Trails Association network in Vermont. Photo by Sam Davies, Three Peaks Media / courtesy of KTA.

A Cross-Border Collaboration Shows the Power of Mountain Biking to Make Small Towns More Resilient

In 2005, Taylor Caswell got a call from a logger he had hired to work on the family’s property in Littleton, New Hampshire. The logger wanted to know what he should do about the trails crisscrossing the land. Caswell, who was not at that time a mountain biker, was shocked to learn about the trails.

Although mountain bikers have pedaled through northeastern fields and forests for decades, many trail networks have developed with little planning and in some cases – as with the Caswell property – without proper permitting or landowner permission. These trails can be a boon to communities. But until recently, there has been little effort among biking groups to coordinate and leverage mountain biking’s growing popularity to give rural communities an economic boost.

Fortunately for Littleton-area riders, Caswell was enthusiastic, not angry, about the trails on his family’s property. He called the local bike shop and asked for a tour. Soon after, he bought a mountain bike and partnered with the local club to build more trails. Now he’s the board chair of PRKR MTN Trails.

The Littleton trails inspired Caswell, who was then executive director of New Hampshire’s Community Development Finance Authority (CDFA), to focus on the economic and community benefits that mountain biking can provide. He also recognized significant challenges.

“I realized that there were neighboring networks that were also disorganized, underfunded, and without sustainable relationships with landowners,” said Caswell, who grew up in Littleton and now lives in Hollis, New Hampshire.

Through CDFA, Caswell hired the Northern Forest Center to study the potential benefits of a trail collective spanning northern New Hampshire and neighboring states. The nonprofit organization found that the benefits of collaborating could be substantial and convened mountain bike trails groups from throughout the region to explore opportunities to work together.

In February 2017, participants established Bike Borderlands. The stated goal of this initiative is to promote trail stewardship across member networks in northern New Hampshire, northern Vermont, western Maine, and southern Quebec, and to develop programs to serve residents, grow tourism, and benefit regional businesses. Bike Borderlands now comprises nine member networks: Coos Trails in Gorham, PRKR MTN in Littleton (built, in part, on Caswell family land), the Franconia Area chapter of the New England Mountain Biking Association (FA-NEMBA), and Bethlehem Trails Association (BTA), all in New Hampshire; Maine’s Inland Woods and Trails in Bethel and Carrabassett Valley Trails; Vermont’s Craftsbury Outdoor Center and Kingdom Trails Association (KTA); and Circuits Frontières in East Hereford, Quebec.

Mountain bikers
Riders cruise down the Fast Times trail in Bethlehem, New Hampshire, part of the BTA network. Photo by Katie Lozancich.

Strength in Numbers

Collaboration has allowed Bike Borderlands networks to learn from each other, share ideas and promotions, and spread the mountain biking love across neighboring networks – including introducing riders familiar with one area to trails within other systems. The networks are within easy driving distance of each other, so riders can visit multiple networks during the course of a weekend.

“Most of the member networks weren’t large enough to attract a ton of people,” said Maura Adams, director of community investment at the Northern Forest Center and the Bike Borderlands coordinator. “Especially at the beginning, they were mostly small, all-volunteer groups that learned from each other and developed a common brand. We wondered how we could draw people biking at member KTA, which has 85 miles of trails on nearly 100 privately owned properties, to neighboring trail networks and use mountain biking to grow thriving communities across the region.”

KTA is the largest and longest established Bike Borderlands member, drawing more than 130,000 rider visits a year. Based in East Burke, Vermont, KTA shares hard-won lessons with the other Borderlands groups, from crowd management on busy weekends to sustainably attracting riders who don’t just want to visit, but some who now want to live in the area full time.

Bike Borderlands member networks learn from each other’s accomplishments and mistakes. “It’s put nine organizations working together,” said Tim Clough, president of FA-NEMBA and co-owner of Iron Furnace Brewing in Franconia. “We’re not battling each other. We’re helping each other with cool ideas that solve problems, and it’s raising the tide for all of us.”

They tour each other’s trails and make suggestions. Over beers and burgers, they talk about what works and what doesn’t. The Northern Forest Center helps with marketing, fundraising, and other administrative tasks for each network – and for Bike Borderlands collectively.

In 2019, the Tour de Borderlands challenged riders to visit all member networks and to patronize local businesses, with a chance to win prizes. In 2021, the Bike Borderlands film festival shared short, promotional films about each network on social media. And after two years of the coronavirus pandemic, the group hopes to resume in-person member rides and meetings to learn, provide moral support, and figure out how to use mountain biking to make the region more appealing and vibrant.

Biking
Dave Harkless, owner of Littleton Bike & Fitness and co-chair of PRKR MTN Trails, descends a boulder in Littleton. Photo by Joe Klementovich / courtesy of The Northern Forest Center.

Ride with Gratitude

One focus of Bike Borderlands’ work has been promoting rider norms that demonstrate respect for the environment, landowners, and other outdoor recreationists. In December 2019, KTA lost several popular trails from its network when three Darling Hill landowners banned bike access on their land. KTA did not publicly share the specifics of these closures, but in the aftermath, inspired by a suggestion voiced at a public hearing, the group asked Bike Borderlands for help developing a shared set of guidelines for riders.

Together, Bike Borderlands networks penned the “Ride With Gratitude” pledge, which was adopted by its members, and by the New England Mountain Bike Association (NEMBA) and Vermont Mountain Bike Association (VMBA). The pledge acknowledges that riding trails on public and private lands is a privilege, not a right, and sets forth expectations for sustainable uses of trails and respectful interactions with other trail users. There are four tenets of Ride with Gratitude: Respect This Gift, Protect Nature, Care for Others, and Be the Example.

“I couldn’t be more proud of the group initiative,” said KTA Executive Director Abby Long. “The pledge encompasses how all people should recreate respectfully. And it’s not just trail groups preaching it. We’ve shared it with local businesses in English and French.”

To date, 435 people have taken the pledge, and that number will likely grow this summer as mountain biking groups continue to promote Ride With Gratitude.

Bike tour
A young rider gains some tips for riding over rocks during a 2019 Tour de Borderlands event in Gorham, New Hampshire. Photo by Ian MacLellan / courtesy of The Northern Forest Center.

Funding Success

Another Borderlands benefit is that member networks have more fundraising clout together than they would alone. The trail groups are really good at building trails, explained Adams, while the Center has a lot of experience securing grant funding: “This partnership lets everyone do what they’re best at and lets us come up with something exciting together.”

To date, Bike Borderlands has provided more than $200,000 in sub-grants to its members from You Have Our Trust, USDA Rural Development, the Neil & Louise Tillotson Fund of the New Hampshire Charitable Foundation, the Davis Conservation Foundation, and individual donors. Grants support trail stewardship, design, construction and maintenance, signage and maps, and broadening access.

In Littleton, PRKR MTN secured a $30,000 grant last year to build a new flow trail, with rolling terrain and banked turns. In neighboring Franconia, FA-NEMBA has received about $12,000 in sub-grants through Bike Borderlands since 2017. FA-NEMBA has also collaborated with neighboring networks Coos Trails, BTA, and PRKR MTN to secure funding for trail work. An expanded network, members hope, will encourage visitors to stay longer.

“The grants we’re getting through Bike Borderlands are network-changing numbers that will have a noticeable effect on the town’s economy,” said Clough. “In 2022 or 2023, trails organizations will add paid positions. FA-NEMBA could double our network in the next two years.”

The expansion of trails can foster a stronger local economy. According to a 2018 Vermont Sustainable Jobs Fund report, KTA contributes $10 million annually to the economy of Burke, Vermont, and over the past 10 years has helped attract 28 new businesses catering to mountain bikers. A 2020 Economic Impact Analysis by the New Hampshire Department of Transportation indicated that bicycle tourism drew some 200,000 out-of-state visitors to New Hampshire in 2018, those visitors spent an estimated $28 million in the state, and bicycle-related tourism supported nearly 400 jobs.

The economic benefits of trails are tangible locally. Clough opened Iron Furnace Brewing in 2017 with three high school friends who wanted a place to drink a beer post-ride on a Sunday. Now, the brewery is a destination for riders and it caters to them with bike racks out front, an amenity that other businesses in town now also offer. This summer, Iron Furnace will add tools and a washstand to its bike rack.

In most of the Bike Borderlands towns, there’s also been a subtle shift from attracting more tourists to making these communities more attractive places to live. Towns and cities throughout northern New England have long acknowledged a “brain drain,” of young people leaving the area to seek jobs and careers elsewhere – and tried to develop ways to both retain that demographic and also to attract others to move here. For instance, in 2022, Maine and Vermont are offering tax incentives and cash incentives to people to move to these states. Bike Borderlands clubs think robust trail networks will also attract people to move to live in their communities. According to Clough, one Franconia realtor claims that her biggest selling points are mountain biking and the brewery.

“One of the primary reasons why we established an Outdoor Recreation Industry Development office at the state level was to connect recreation activities to workforce recruitment,” said Caswell, who is now commissioner of the New Hampshire Department of Business and Economic Affairs. “It’s a statewide strategy. A lot of communities are seeing the value of recruiting the younger generation, people who are 24 to 40, to live in our communities, and be part of our communities. Trail networks are great tools for communities to attract that type of individual and demographic. Recreation plays a key factor in attracting new residents, whether they’re individuals who want to access trails out their backyard, or families who want to raise their children with access to outdoor assets.”

Adaptive trail
A group of adaptive riders spins along the Violet’s Outback trail in the Kingdom Trails Association network. Photo by Lilias Ide / courtesy of KTA.

Ready to Adapt

By ensuring new trails are accessible to people who ride adaptive bikes and retrofitting existing trails to accommodate hand-cycles, several of the groups in the Bike Borderlands network are building “an adaptive bike mecca,” according to Kelly Walsh, executive director of Franconia-based Adaptive Sports Partners of the North Country (ASPNC). “Together, we’re working toward creating trails for everyone from the start,” said Walsh.

Currently, Kingdom Trails Association has 53 miles of adaptive-friendly trails, with more in the works. Last summer, KTA hosted adaptive biker clinics with the Kelly Brush Foundation. Other Borderlands networks are looking at how they can become more adaptive-friendly, too.

With the help of the Christopher Reeve Foundation and Madeline Von Weber Trust, ASPNC has secured three new adaptive bikes for loan. Walsh said there are a lot of fun projects underway with Bike Borderlands networks that will benefit the adaptive community. Some will be announced in summer 2023, and some are longer-term. For starters, in some networks, maps will be labeled when trails are adaptive-friendly.

Making a trail adaptive involves managing off-camber stretches and making sure bridges are wide enough to accommodate adaptive bikes. These trails can be as chill or challenging as any mountain bike trail.

“Athletes with adaptive bikes are looking for the same mountain bike experience that everyone is looking for, and it covers all the levels of difficulty,” said Walsh. “The commitment is there and it’s growing, and it’s a commitment from both us and Borderlands.”

Athletes who want to borrow a bike or to book a volunteer or instructor to ride with can reach out to ASPNC through adaptivesportspartners.org.

Infinity glade
A sign marks the Infinity Glade trail in Franconia. Photo by Meghan McCarthy McPhaul.

Sustainable Growth

Looking forward to the next two years, Bike Borderlands members have agreed to common goals that include expanding adaptive biking trails and youth programming, and diversifying trails.

“Before Borderlands, all we had was old-school riding,” said Dave Harkless, who owns Littleton Bike & Fitness and is co-chair of PRKR MTN. “Someone would buy a mountain bike and would come back from a ride pissed-off and bloody. Now we’re building beginner-friendly trails, and people buy a bike and come back with smiles. We have a parking lot, signage, and maps. Six years ago, if we got a grant for $2,000 we were over the moon. Now, we’re getting more significant funding. Our main trail builder has a company and equipment including mini excavators and trucks. Trails have upped the game for everyone.”

Well-built, well-maintained trails can encourage land conservation, too. “In so many cases, a 2-foot-wide strip of dirt through a property has let locals build a relationship with the land so they can appreciate conservation efforts there and feel ownership of it,” said Clough. “There are going to be areas that should be hands-off to trails, but part of the collaboration is fitting the pieces together in a responsible manner.”

When a key trails corridor above the Franconia airport changed hands, the realtor for the deal introduced Clough to the new owners. They walked the trails together, and during the walk the landowners went from ambivalent to excited about trails, renaming one trail on the spot and pledging to keep trails on their land open. They’ve joined FA-NEMBA meetings and have become advocates for trails.

Organized trail networks also stem renegade trail building; this in turn attracts landowners as partners. “We invite landowners to events and group rides,” said Harkless. “The town administrator is working with us. With [town] support, we’ve applied for bicycle-friendly community designation through the League of American Bicyclists. We pitched the idea to the select board, and three days later they approved us moving forward with the application.”

Adams said the success of Bike Borderlands isn’t just new miles of trails, although all Bike Borderlands networks have grown. “What we’re working toward,” said Adams, “includes mileage of sustainably built and maintained trails, and trails that can handle increasing traffic, that minimize environmental impact, that serve all riders, that connect to downtowns for a better rider experience, and that support local business and make communities more livable.”

The group doesn’t plan to add more members, but Adams hopes Bike Borderlands serves as a model for the positive impact trail groups can have when they team up.

“We have found a real ability to work together,” said Caswell.

“We’re at one of those moments in time when we have all the right people sitting around trying to do similar things and with goals in mind…. People are moving to our towns because of these trails. It’s what we need. Until now, I only imagined what the group could do, and we’re just at the beginning.”

View the accompanying Web Extra Short Films: Mountain Biking

Discussion *

Jun 23, 2022

A really nicely written and informative article.  This article should be shared with all New England states and their communities to not only inspire mountain biking friendly development but to show that when groups and individuals that have similar ideas great community dividends can happen in a positive way.  It’s good too that this article did mention that there can be hurdles and through positive work by everyone on all sides of a given issue, the hurdle can be overcome for everyones benefit.

dave coulter

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