Trail Organizations Forced to Get Creative in COVID Times
Words by Danielle Baker
With indoor recreation facilities and most organized sports cancelled for this spring and summer, trails in British Columbia have seen an explosion of users in the last few months. With the traditional mountain bike fundraising events usually held at this time of year also cancelled, trail organizations in the province are looking at new ways to support trail maintenance.
“COVID-19 has definitely increased trail usership by all groups, which is great, but our trails got pretty beat up,” says Julie Henderson, President of the Fraser Valley Mountain Bikers Association (FVMBA). “The trail usage tracking data on Trailforks shows that the Fraser Valley region alone had a 97% increase for the month of April from 2019 to 2020.”
View this post on InstagramA post shared by FVMBA (@fvmba) on Apr 9, 2020 at 11:45am PDT
Fundraising Alternatives
Most mountain bike organizations would have already run races as revenue generators by this time of year. Events such as the Vedder Mountain Classic in the Fraser Valley; the Rusty Chain Poker Ride in Terrace; the first stops of the Island Cup Race Series on Vancouver Island; and many more have all been cancelled.
For locations like Terrace, the lack of fundraising and trail work events is especially problematic. “We have a much shorter riding and building season than places like the Sea to Sky,” explains Aleksa Havelaar, Trails Director and Vice-President, Terrace Off-Road Cycling Association (TORCA North), “so to have the pandemic hit right when we would nor
View this post on Instagram