Fee Schedule at Hillside

[sensorysonic]

Hillside park has their fee schedule and paybox in place. The fee is $4 per person per day. A season pass is $25 per person. Remember, this fee is per person, not per vehicle. Riders traveling together in the same vehicle must all have their day pass or season pass affixed to the windshield of the vehicle. Bikers who ride to the trail must carry their day pass or season pass on their person. Envelopes for the daypass are at the trailhead, detach the stub, and affix to windshield. A season pass can be obtained from Elk River Recreation at 1104 Lions Park Drive. Their phone number is 763-635-1150. The Blast group would also like us to ride the course without skidding our tires, especially on the descents, as this erodes the trail. They suggest keeping our weight over the rear tire, braking with both brakes, without skidding, and keeping our tires inflated no higher then 40-45 psi. Avoid skidding or locking up the brakes, as this severely erodes this trail. Blast also has a trail maintenance bulletin on the Hillside City Park sign.

[homebrewbiker]

[QUOTEThe Blast group would also like us to ride the course without skidding our tires, especially on the descents, as this erodes the trail. They suggest keeping our weight over the rear tire, braking with both brakes, without skidding, and keeping our tires inflated no higher then 40-45 psi. Avoid skidding or locking up the brakes, as this severely erodes this trail.[/QUOTE]

I only rode the trail once, but this seems easier said than done on some of those really steep downhill sections with sharp turns thrown in. When I rode there was someone who seemed like a pretty good rider and I could hear her skidding down those same sections.

[Kevin Leis]

I ride Hillside park about twice a week, and I feel that it isn't to hard not to skid. Granted I know the trail very well. but I dont think there is anything there steep enough to need to bleed off that much speed . One thing I've done to help prevent skidding is to adjust my rear brake cable and lever so that I have to pull it in about half way before the brake engages. The rear brake won't feel as firm as many would prefer but it will modulate alot better. The draw back to this is less total braking force when the lever bottoms out but the front brake really stops you any way. I used to like both levers firm but discovered ( through neglect) that the rear brake is easier to control this way.

[gopherhockey]

Unfortunately I think we are always going to have people at a level that skid I'm afraid. (both beginners and fast riders) Many bikes you cannot adjust brakes as you are suggesting. (disc etc.) I lile hillside quite a bit (wish I lived closer..) but there are a few areas of trail there (like some of the areas at Lebanon) that will probably degrade and need to be re-routed before nature takes over and really starts wrecking things. :hit:

I'm not being critical of the trail crew or the trail here - we have the same issues in a few small areas. Its hard to fix those bumps that form from skidding - you can't really fill them in... usually you live with them as they get bigger or you have to do something a little more drastic.

We have discussed and thought of a few ways to experiment with a few things to work around and/or cover these areas up.... (like putting in small sections of boardwalk over it if appropriate)

Best to just fix it once in a way that doesn't require repair time and time again... especially before rain starts to wash them out even further.

Just to be clear again, I'm not being critical of trail crews efforts... thats not what we're all about. Good and bad we're all doing our best and I think the sport as a whole is really growing up in its trail methods.

Kudos to their putting up a sign with some basic riding rules at Elk River. We can always use that kind of thing.

Maybe more educational group rides are also in order... ;)