News from Northwest Trail Alliance

NWTA Newsletter - November '09

In This Issue:

Please attend our Nov 24 General Meeting & Board Elections

NWTA strengthens link with IMBA, becomes first IMBA Chapter in the Northwest

Advocacy Update: Signs of Progress for Forest Park Singletrack

Next Tuesday's general meeting at the Lucky Lab NW Beer Hall will not only be our last general meeting of the year, but also one of the most important ones: it will feature the election of four new board members and a vote on NWTA's new bylaws, created at a recent board retreat.

In the wake of the decision to become an IMBA chapter (see next article), the board felt this was a good time to update and streamline our bylaws. Our hope is that the new bylaws - modeled after the IMBA chapter bylaws - will increase our organizational effectiveness and set us up for future success. The proposed bylaws are posted in their entirety on the NWTA web site.

Second major item on the agenda are the Board Elections: four well-qualified candidates are standing for election: Tom Slovak, Joel Holly, Will Heiberg and Brian Bauman. Click here to read the candidates' complete bios.

We will close the evening with our annual recognition of the past year's top volunteers.

The general meeting is open to NWTA members and non-members alike. If you are currently not a member, but like to join (or rejoin) NWTA and exercise your right to vote, you will be able to do so at the meeting. Or even more convenient: sign up online.

rthwest Trail Alliance has decided to upgrade its relationship with the International Mountain Biking Association from IMBA affiliate to IMBA chapter. In doing so, says NWTA board member Joe Barcott, "our organization stands to gain increased membership and business efficiencies, not to mention access to IMBA's considerable resources in support of advocacy efforts, trail care, fundraising, and promotion. By combining separate NWTA and IMBA memberships in the region, it gives us a bigger voice when it comes to advocacy," says Barcott, who has led NWTA's negotiations with IMBA. "We'll be more effective overall."

Barcott also points out that the burden of processing and fulfilling membership renewals will now fall to IMBA, a professionally staffed organization. "It's sometimes hard to get volunteers to do that sort of bookkeeping work. Now we can harness our local volunteers on more gratifying creative and social tasks."

Barcott says that it will take a few months for the actual merger of memberships to be finalized, primarily because both IMBA and NWTA are currently in the process of upgrading and improving their websites, computer capacities, and membership administration. "But come April, we hope to be firing on all pistons... er, pedals."

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Advocacy Update: Signs of Progress for Forest Park Singletrack.

The right to mountain bike in Forest Park was the very issue around which Portland Urban Mountain Pedalers-the organization that morphed into Northwest Trail Alliance-was formed 21 years ago, so it's no surprise that our group is leading the way on the current effort to increase singletrack opportunities in Portland's mammoth urban greenspace. Six longtime mountain bike advocates - including two NWTA board members - have been invited to serve on a committee convened by Portland's Parks Bureau to arrive at a consensus on the issue by spring of 2010.

That is good news, says Tom Archer, NWTA's Advocacy Director. "We form an active contingent on the committee of 15," says Archer. "We have some very knowledgeable and experienced people providing the committee with real data-user demand studies, studies on trail impacts by mountain bikers, and info on how to manage multi-use trails. It's expertise that serves our position and reflects very well on the mountain biking community as a whole." Archer points out that two of the committee members, Chris Bernhardt and Jill Van Winkle, are full time IMBA employees -- literally professional mountain bike advocates and expert trail builders.

NWTA's goal is to eventually have 15-20 miles of singletrack within the park, though Archer hopes that some mileage will actually open up as early as next summer. He says that the committee will likely consider three options: building new trail, repurposing some of the existing fire lane trails so they are no longer fall line trails, and lastly, sharing some existing trail that is currently not open to bicyclists. Archer believes that the final solution will end up being a combination of all three options, though "the quickest access would be trail sharing," he says, "but any sharing arrangement has to be well thought out. If not, it has the potential to backfire and that won't help our cause in the long term."

The committee has met four times already, and is being closely monitored by Parks Director Zari Santner and Parks Commissioner Nick Fish, who has publicly expressed support for additional mountain biking options in Forest Park. "We've got the attention of the top people at the city level," says Archer, who reports that the committee will continue to meet monthly throughout the winter. What can NWTA members do? Be patient, says Archer. "Fish and Santner want the committee to do its job first. At some point in the future there will be a public comment period and that's when we'll want people to mobilize."

Archer also reports that NWTA is working with the Portland Parks and Recreation on improving the mountain biking experience at Powell Butte, an off-road trails and skills park at the Gateway Green project, and on building some smaller-scale bike skills parks and pump tracks within the city limits. "There are lots of exciting projects in the pipeline at this time," he says. "Stay tuned."

For more info on Portland Parks & Recreation Commissioner Nick Fish's stance on the issue, read Jonathan Maus' recent interview with Nick Fish on BikePortland.org.

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Upcoming Events:

XC Singletrack Trail Building at Stub Stewart State Park - Sun 11/22, 9:00am - 1:30pm
Join Stub Stewart trail care & advocacy guru Joe Rykowski and his gang for one last morning of building all-new, MTB specific singletrack trails in Oregon's newest State Park, less than an hour west of Portland.

Lewis River Trail Ride - Sun 11/22, 7:30am-3:00pm
Wish fall goodbye, say hello to winter on our last ride of the year on the Lewis River Trail. Many consider this one of the most beautiful trails in the larger Portland area. The ride will be lead by our Mount St Helens and SW Washington trail reps David Anderson and Jerry DeRuyter, so you definitely won't have to worry about getting lost.

NWTA Monthly Meeting & Board Elections - Tue 11/24, 7:30pm - 9:00pm (social time start at 6:30pm)
Join us at the NW Lucky Lab for our last general meeting of the year. More details: see first article of this newsletter.

Powell Butte Trail Care Day - Sat 12/12, 9:00am - Noon
Join Portland Parks & Recreation and NWTA in rebuilding and restoring the trail system at Powell Butte.

For more details about other trail work parties, rides and meetings, please check our Event Calendar.

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