Category Archives: Land managers

Advocacy, Land managers

Could mountain biking be part of Northfield’s new Meadows Park?

Back in the summer of 2013, I blogged on Locally Grown Northfield about the mountain biking-related possibilities for Northfield’s new Meadows Park. So it was pretty cool to attend the City of Northfield‘s Meadows Park community planning meeting at the Northfield Middle School on Wednesday night and have mountain biking be mentioned by the consultants (Paul Miller Design and SRF Consulting) as one of the possibilities under consideration.

Meadows Park community meeting Paul Miller Design and SRF Consulting Meadows Park community meeting

Even better, there was some support for it from citizens at the small group discussions, helped along by participation from fellow CROCT members Marty Larson and Scott Klein.

Meadows Park community meeting, small group discussion Meadows Park community meeting, small group discussion Meadows Park community meeting, small group discussion

After the meeting, we had some informal discussions with Ward 2 Councilor David DeLong, At-Large Councilor Rhonda Pownell, and PRAB Chair Dale Gehring, as well as City Administrator Nick Haggenmiller, Community Planning and Development Director Chris Heineman, and Interim Public Works Director/City Engineer Brian Erickson.

The CROCT Board has not taken an official position on what we’d like to see in the way of mountain biking for the park.  But in our comments, we talked about the advantages of having:

  • a beginner/intermediate-level singletrack (multi-use) trail around the perimeter of the park
  • a bike park in one corner, with features like pump tracks, dirt jumps, and a skills course, all serving a range of abilities (progression) including a tot area
  • West Trailhead, Lebanon Hills MTB Parka pavilion area with bathrooms, changing facilities, picnic tables, grills, water fountains. See the West Trailhead facilities page for Dakota County’s Lebanon Hills MTB Park for a good example.

The next Meadows Park community meeting will be on Jan. 21.

Want more information about Meadows Park? See these documents that I extracted from the Nov. 20 PRAB meeting agenda packet:

Issues, Land managers

Impact of CROCT’s mountain bike trails in Sechler Park

2 Comments

CROCT board members and City of Northfield Public Works staff have recently heard from some citizens who are concerned about our mountain bike trail-building activities in Sechler Park. While we are reaching out to these citizens to meet face-to-face, we thought it would help to also address some of the issues here on our blog and invite further comments and discussion from anyone who might be interested.

  • Approval to build trails
    CROCT Board members first met with staff from the City of Northfield’s Public Works department in early 2014 to discuss the possibility of creating mountain bike trails in one or more City parks. We then attended CROCT and Northfield PRABa Park and Recreation Advisory Board (PRAB) meeting to present our ideas and received their support for putting a beginner/intermediate level multi-use trail in the river bottoms area of Sechler Park.  We created a short demo trail in the spring and walked it with PRAB Chair Dale Gehring and Assistant Public Works Director Brian Erickson.  We’re now in the final stages of crafting a formal Memorandum of Agreement (MOA) with the City of Northfield.  The trails are/will be entirely on City park property, not along the river’s edge which is managed by the MN DNR.
  • Impact on wildlife
    Sechler Park is a City of Northfield community park, primarily dedicated to recreational athletics (baseball, softball, lacrosse, etc).  It’s not a wilderness park. However, there is a strip of wooded land between the river and the athletic fields and the park’s access road that’s more Sechler Park mapconducive to wildlife. Our mountain bike trails there are like many of the City’s parks and trails which are designed to encourage and accommodate human activity in the midst of nature.  CROCT is a chapter of the International Mountain Bicycling Association (IMBA). And one of IMBA’s Rules of the Trail is to never scare animals or deliberately disturb wildlife. We will regularly educate CROCT members about this rule.
  • Park improvements
    The strip of land where we have our trails in Sechler Park floods regularly.  In years past prior to it being park land, dirt, rocks, and construction debris were regularly dumped there. A significant percentage of the acreage is infested with buckthorn. The CROCT trails turn these liabilities into assets for the long-term recreational benefit of area citizens.
  • Multi-use trails
    All the new CROCT trails in Sechler Park are multi-use, open to walkers. The trails are relatively flat and twisty, so the speeds of mountain bikers are relatively low. And another one of IMBA’s Rules of the Trail is to yield to other non-motorized trail users, letting fellow trail users know you’re coming and anticipating other trail users as you ride around corners.
  • Expanding access
    One of Sechler Park’s advantages is that it is easily accessible by bicyclists via the Mill Towns Trail and the City of Northfield’s paved trails since the construction of the Peggy Prowe Pedestrian Bridge over the Cannon River. The addition of mountain bike trails in Sechler means that area residents don’t need to haul their mountain bikes with vehicles to enjoy the sport. This is particularly beneficial for area youth.  And with the rapid expansion of the Minnesota High School Cycling League‘s mountain bike racing program, we’ll have a place for local youth to practice.
  • Illegal motorized use
    There have been reports of motorcycles and ATV’s in Sechler Park on occasion, and there are concerns that CROCT’s mountain bike trails there will encourage more of this illegal use. Our trails are not designed to accommodate motorized use and we’ll be as vigilant as possible in discouraging it by reporting abuse to City Parks staff and the police. But the experience of public land managers throughout the state is that once mountain bike trails get established and properly maintained, illegal trail use by motorized vehicles rapidly disappears.

We’re interested in getting feedback on our response to these concerns and discussing the issues online, phone or face-to-face. Feel free to attach a comment to this blog post or contact us.

Land managers

Initial discussion with the Bridgewater Township Planning Commission: can we reclaim an abandoned gravel pit for mountain biking?

Bridgewater Township Planning Commission, March 21 Bridgewater Township Planning Commission, March 21
I made a brief presentation about CROCT to the Bridgewater Township Planning Commission last week. They seemed to like the idea of reclaiming an abandoned gravel pit for a mountain bike park but there was no action item. Here’s the background on the issue:

Back in February, I got an email from Northfielder Jeff Stremcha, a cyclist who’s on the Bridgewater Township Planning Commission:

Hi Griff – hope all is well with you. Fat-tiring the gravel is OK, but I’m starting to get ready for some other riding options! I wanted to drop a quick note to pass along a small bit of info based upon a brief exchange I had with Marty down at the bagel shop. He mentioned that you, he and a couple others are working on forming a mtb club in Nfld. Cool.

When Bridgewater Township was working with SMC on a renewal of their permits for the gravel mining operations at the Dundas Wash Plant, Terry Overn, a principle with SMC, mentioned that the Aggregate & Ready Mix Association of MN apparently has some interest, and potentially some level of funding, for doing a gravel mine reclamation project that they could use as a demonstration project with a goal of generating some community goodwill. Terry seemed to think that an off-road bicycle trail project might be a good candidate and mentioned it to me because there are some abandoned mining sites in Bridgewater Township that might provide a suitable location for such a project.

He suggested that someone should contact the Executive Director of the association, Fred Corrigan, at 952-707-1250 to see if there might be merit in further discussions.

I thought that maybe you, or someone in your group, might be interested in calling Fred. Since I had your email, I figured I’d give you the info. If someone does call, I’d suggest mentioning that Terry suggested it to us. I would presume that SMC is a significant member of the association.

I think that’s about all I know but I can try to clarify if you have questions. Take care – think spring!

I replied to Jeff:

Hey Jeff, good to hear from you… and that you’re getting the itch for something more than gravel!

Our mountain bike club got rolling last Sunday night: CROCT (Cannon River Offroad Cycling & Trails) and we have the beginnings of a website up at https://croct.org/ You probably know some of the people at that first meeting. We’ve had a few more join us since then.

As for gravel pit reclamation, Bruce Anderson and I had a conversation about it with Bridgewater Township Board supervisor Kathleen Doran-Norton about 10 days ago. How’s that for coincidence?

She not only knows of several abandoned mines but in some cases, knows the private land owners between them and thinks easements are possible that would allow an offroad bike trail between them.

So your timing couldn’t be better. We have a private web-based project planning service we’re using to organize the club and plan all our tasks, so I’ll copy/paste your email there so we can figure out who does what next. Rest assured, one of us will contact Fred Corrigan and maybe Terry Overn, too.

And if you’re interested in getting involved with the organizational stage of the club, let me know.

Of course, this could very likely involved the Rice County parks people since there could be a way of connecting a mtb trail to one or more of the abandoned gravel mines.

I’ll email Kathleen Doran-Norton about this today, with a CC to Bruce Anderson.

Shortly thereafter, I had a long phone chat with Fred Corrigan,  Exec Director of the Aggregate & Ready Mix Association of MN. He explained that Rice County collects an aggregate tax and 15% of those proceeds goes into a special fund for gravel pit reclamation. In 2011, this amounted to $4,500.  One to-do: to find out from the County what their current balance is and how to apply for it.  

The good news: the DNR and Le Sueur County tried to create a 20 acre mountain bike park with a pump track using these and other funds a couple years ago but the private property owner decided to sell.  

News article Sept 2010: Le Sueur County eyes reclaim of old pits

However, state statute has limited the use of reclamation funds for public land. Last year changes were made to the statute, enabling reclamation funds to be applied to abandoned pits on private property. Pettis said with the DNR’s help, reclaiming some of the pits in the county becomes more feasible.

So we might be able to get DNR involvement in a similar attempt in Bridgewater Twshp, especially if the abandoned pit is adjacent to the DNR’s Mill Towns Trail which will soon be extended between Faribault and Dundas along a rail line.  (I blogged the details about this here: http://locallygrownnorthfield.org/post/29507 )

(Some links: Southern Minnesota Construction (SMC) operates the Dundas Wash Plant; the MN DNR has a page on mine reclamation and a PDF handbook titled A Handbook for Reclaiming Sand and Gravel Pits in Minnesota.)

I later got this followup email from Fred Corrigan:

Good to talk to you today about the possibility of reclaiming currently unreclaimed aggregate pits into an mountain bike facility in Bridgewater Township in Rice County.

I have attached some information about the aggregate tax that is collected by some counties and the possible use of a portion of those funds for the purpose of reclaiming abandoned and unreclaimed aggregate pits.

I understand that you have a meeting of your group tonight and will get back to me after that meeting. I also understand that you will attempt to determine the ownership (public or private) of these potential properties and talk to the county about available funding for this kind of recreation project from the aggregate tax or other county funding. We also discussed the DNR’s interest in projects like this.

I look forward to continuing this discussion. I have copied officials of SMC who have been involved in these projects and are actively involved in the Aggregate & Ready Mix Association of MN (ARM).

Land managers

Our presentation to the Northfield Park and Recreation Advisory Board: good vibes

CROCT presentation to March 20 Northfield Park and Recreation Advisory BoardMarty Larson and I made a brief presentation to the Northfield Park and Recreation Advisory Board (PRAB) last night. They seemed to like our plan to create river bottoms mountain bike trail in Sechler Park, and seemed open to exploring the possibility of a trail in Roosevelt Park and Roosevelt Ridge Park. They also wondered if Odd Fellows Park, site of a new dog park, might be a park that could accommodate both a trail and a bike park/pump track.

We were asked send a formal letter of request to the Parks staff requesting a formal agreement between CROCT and the City, starting with permission to work on a trail in Sechler Park this spring. Staff will take that request to their weekly staff Development Review Committee (DRC) meeting and then put it into an upcoming City Council meeting packet, hopefully with a recommendation that the Council direct the PRAB and the staff to work with CROCT on implementation.

Here are links to some of the maps and resources we used in our presentation:

Sechler Park

Roosevelt Park

Hauberg Woods

Small pump tracks and skills parks

Northfield Parks Resources