Advocacy

Eastern PA Mountain Bike Action Alert: April 2007
For release:
Joe Transue
Eastern PA IMBA Rep
610-533-0942
transue@msn.com

Deadline for Public comment: April 6th, 2007

Since many of my earliest trails miles were put in at Jacobsburg, I've been interacting with equestrians for more than ten years.
For a portion of that time I admit to being clueless.

I recently attended a trail-building seminar where there were many equestrians present, so I had the opportunity to get the word straight from the... (really bad joke). Here are a few hints you might find helpful when riding Jacobsburg, Blue Marsh or any other place that welcomes equestrians.

Sharing this info from a mailing list I subscribe to...

HB 779 SUNDAY HUNTING

There are 3 million hikers in Pennsylvania, plus 621,000 backpackers. Add the 1.4 million wildlife-watchers who enjoy our forests and you have a pretty good resident constituency of forest-users. That's not even counting the many others who visit our state to hike, go birding and stroll on our thousands of miles of footpaths.

The economic value of those numbers far outweigh that of our one million hunters.

solt, a while ago you sent a link about sale of land threatening trails. i heard back from my friend that is a president of a land preservation group there and said none of the lands in question threaten any trails.

got an email from someone and it pretty much sums it up

---------------------------
Joe,

in addition to the salisbury project i would like to go after the lower dirt area. I would like to apply for the KONA grant to creat a dj park down there. I would like to work with a few local DJ experts to come up with a design.

2007 Kona Grants Announced

Saturday, March 31st
Holy Cross Lutheran Church
Nazareth, PA

Learn about designing and building proper, sustainable multi-use trails.

Please note, you must register for this by March 15.

See the pdf (click on link, below) for details.

If you have any questions, post them here and I'll do my best to get answers.
Please also post here if you register or plan to attend.

Thanks,
Doug

From The Morning Call
March 6, 2007
Officials aim to keep Lehigh Mountain green
A consultant will be hired to find 'best use' for county recreation.
By Romy Varghese Of The Morning Call
With its century-old hardwood forest and wildlife, Lehigh Mountain provides a swath of natural beauty surrounded by development.

But no one has looked at it in its entirety, said Lehigh County General Services Director Jan Creedon.

That will change when the county hires a consultant to develop a master site plan for the mountain — ''to really look at it as one big, green space,'' Creedon said.

was looking at the BANNF(sp) info and saw the conservancy report on the preserve land in emmaus. i wish i knew when this came out but anyway it has a ton of useful information and in the "recommendations" sections has some opportunity for VMB to partner with the conservancy to rebuild kiosks, fencing and it even said that they recommend singletrack as trails. there wasn't mention of not having new trails and also mentioned moving the trailhead. Just my suggestions but ultimately it's up to the club and/or cycling community to pursue this.

At the last two meetings we were talking about possibly having a revival of the Bike Patrol, and Joey T said he'll be putting together an IMBA Bike Patrol training session in the near future, probably at French creek and possibly the same weekend as the race (and our camping trip). This training does not cover First Aid or CPR however, those are things you have to get certified in separately, which if we have a big enough group we can probably take the course together.

So I've got two questions: