29 June 2008

Trail building proposal submitted to the NPDC Park Dept.

A proposal has been submitted to the New Plymouth District Council's Parks Dept to use approved contractors to construct new singletrack trails in the northern area of Mangamahoe Forest.

We plan to do this in the immediate term by using NPDC approved contractors (Southstar Adventures Ltd) to build trails in the northern area of the forest that has recently been logged, see the yellow trails below. The funding to pay the contractors would initially come from the Transit NZ compensation money received in 2001, currently held by the NPDC in its suspense account.

The club hopes that this proposal will also lead onto to a formal Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between the club and the NPDC regarding the long term trail development, promotion and maintenance of the mountain bike facilities at the Mangamahoe Forest.

04 June 2008

Track Marking Out North Mangamahoe

Members of the NP Mountainbikers club have been marking out routes for replacement XC trails in the recently logged northern area of Mangamahoe.

Work involved determining routes, marking out with a string line and tape and attaching to posts, stumps etc. GPS shows about 2900 metres of track marked out so far and there is more to go. The trail links back into the existing trails left in the unlogged area to the south plus lead down to the recent logging skid area at the northern end adjacent to the access road.

The yellow trails show what has been marked out, the magenta ones are what are planned, the red and green lines show existing roads and singletrack trails:



The timber lying on the ground along the route needs to be cleared away with a digger and some grooming of what is left is envisaged. Then the trees will be planted around the trails.