Is this the right attitude towards mtb advocacy and trail maintenance?

[Ivan]

I don't think any of us are telling you to do this ... however, I presume in the last 2.5 years (equivalent to the original writer's riding experience) ... you haven't been working 7 days per week ... or even if you have you have put together a 3 or 4 line email to a relevant email campaign affecting your state or local trails ... or anything related to trail preservation.

As Flynny put it ... there is more to it then just shovelling dirt

Agreed, but that hardly the gist of the original post.

It seems to happen at every club, that some of the people who attend build days start thinking that everyone else should be putting in as much effort as they do, and become very vocal about it. As evidenced in this thread the "No Build, No Ride" is an ethos that some people believe strongly in, but I don't think should apply to PUBLIC trails.

I believe that there should be a shift away from the mentality where the only reason you become a financial member of a club is so that you can race, to people being encouraged to become financial members in clubs to help promote advocacy and help with trail maintenance. I can't make it along to most races, or maintenance days, but I'd be happy for my membership fee's to be used to pay for Equipment, food, drink, advocacy costs.

 

[martinpb]

Agreed, but that hardly the gist of the original post.

It seems to happen at every club, that some of the people who attend build days start thinking that everyone else should be putting in as much effort as they do, and become very vocal about it. As evidenced in this thread the "No Build, No Ride" is an ethos that some people believe strongly in, but I don't think should apply to PUBLIC trails.

It's not quite like that - the people who put in and build would (from my experience) love to be nobs who don't want to be bothered fixing up trails on public land. Unfortunatly, they don't own a sheep station of their own, so they get out and do a bit. They'd just like to spread the load a little seeing as there are at least 450 riders within driving distance of Lysterfield (number of entries for CTS)

BTW-anyone with PR/comms skills/quals/experience get in touch, love to have that skill set covered

 

[daddyrat]

I don't get all this. If one lokes riding but not build then ride and don't build. if one likes to do both do both. I reckon he's being guilt tripped or maybe extremely self concious.
whatever. Have fun riding, don't wreck the trails of other ppl and sooner or later you'll find a group you'd like to dif with and then start diggin'
have fun anyway

 

[martinpb]

I believe that there should be a shift away from the mentality where the only reason you become a financial member of a club is so that you can race, to people being encouraged to become financial members in clubs to help promote advocacy and help with trail maintenance. I can't make it along to most races, or maintenance days, but I'd be happy for my membership fee's to be used to pay for Equipment, food, drink, advocacy costs.

This didn't seem to be in the original post.

This is the general idea of trail building groups - if you ride you pay in one way or another. Some people will still rort the system and ride for years without ever putting anything back into the sport, but that's just the world we live in. In general i feel that people are happy to do a little to make things happen, in any of the ways that have been discussed at length on any number of threads on RB (advocacy/building/funding...)

 

[FR Drew]

Hmm, plucking figures from thin air as ballpark guesses:

Canberra Population 350,000
MTB riders approx 20,000 (includes kids, families, casuals, very occasionals) (about 5% of population)
Club members in CORC around 750 (about 3.5% of mtb riders total)

I would guess that even counting the folks out building illegal track is Canberra, there would be less than 100 total. Regular builders there are probably 10 to 15. Most of them don't do working bee stuff, they just chip away at their own little piece of heaven.

Even when club trail building days were well planned, well publicised in advance, food and drink provided etc, it was very rare to get more than 15 folks show up.

While you may wish that more people took part, you need to get over the fact that they don't and they won't. Most people don't give blood either, even though they could. Trying to guilt them into it won't help. Making work regular, giving lots of advance notice and having build days well organised helps a bit, but even then will probably only result in a threefold increase in attendees (and most of that will only be for the first couple of days, after that folks feel as if they have "put in" and stop showing up no matter what you do).

Plan your trails well, build and maintain what you can, appreciate the help if it's offered, but don't expect it, from club members or anyone else, you're just chasing rainbows.

Some folks put in heaps year after year, some do for a while and then stop, some never do.

Get over it.

It's a fact of life and giving people crap about it is just going to get folks offside, it won't change behaviours.

ADDENDUM:
8 people who don't want to be there out of a crew of 12 builders is worse than having 4 people who are motivated there by themselves. More folks showing up (especially if they're only doing it out of guilt) is not always better than a core group who really want to be there.

 

[ido09s]

A question for you all

Of all the people in here who attend trail maintenance days how many of you attend 'legal' trail maintenance days? and how often do you attend them versus the amount of time you ride?

 

[ando_assi]

A question for you all

Of all the people in here who attend trail maintenance days how many of you attend 'legal' trail maintenance days? and how often do you attend them versus the amount of time you ride?

I help organize 1 day a month and i would ride twice a week

the post was titled "is this the right attitude"

The answer in my head is "NO"

If like riding mtbs tracks, it is not somebody else's responsibility to build and maintain them....

There are other ways of helping if don't want to "build" get onto your local club and ask if you can help....

 

[trav]

Hmm, plucking figures from thin air as ballpark guesses:

Canberra Population 350,000
MTB riders approx 20,000 (includes kids, families, casuals, very occasionals) (about 5% of population)
Club members in CORC around 750 (about 3.5% of mtb riders total)

I would guess that even counting the folks out building illegal track is Canberra, there would be less than 100 total. Regular builders there are probably 10 to 15. Most of them don't do working bee stuff, they just chip away at their own little piece of heaven.

Even when club trail building days were well planned, well publicised in advance, food and drink provided etc, it was very rare to get more than 15 folks show up.

While you may wish that more people took part, you need to get over the fact that they don't and they won't. Most people don't give blood either, even though they could. Trying to guilt them into it won't help. Making work regular, giving lots of advance notice and having build days well organised helps a bit, but even then will probably only result in a threefold increase in attendees (and most of that will only be for the first couple of days, after that folks feel as if they have "put in" and stop showing up no matter what you do).

Plan your trails well, build and maintain what you can, appreciate the help if it's offered, but don't expect it, from club members or anyone else, you're just chasing rainbows.

Some folks put in heaps year after year, some do for a while and then stop, some never do.

Get over it.

It's a fact of life and giving people crap about it is just going to get folks offside, it won't change behaviours.

Could not agree any more ,well put.If people want to help they will ,if not stiff shit it does not bother me.

Working bees in general are a waste of time as there is not enough people who have suitable skills to guide the well wishers,resualting in more time spent afterwards cleaning up further mess created.

 

[top_oz_bloke]

Im a volunteer who puts in time on top of the organised build days.

I do it becase I enjoy the work. I get satisfaction fixing stuff up. I get satisfaction when others say the work is good (not always the case - I'm still learning and I've done a few shit jobs).

If people want to chip in then that's fine. If they just want to enjoy the trails then I'm cool with that too. I personally don't feel there should be any pressure on anyone to do trailwork (unless its some sort of private use trail but that's not what we're talking about here).

 

[Elbo]

Could not agree any more ,well put.If people want to help they will ,if not stiff shit it does not bother me.

Working bees in general are a waste of time as there is not enough people who have suitable skills to guide the well wishers,resualting in more time spent afterwards cleaning up further mess created.

Well put from FR Drew and I agree with trav. I don't think the attitude presented in the original post/link is 'right', but I don't particularly care either. Its easy to get your nose out of joint wrestling with people with those attitudes. If someone takes 2 blog posts to justify to themselves and others their own attitude towards trailwork, then I think their problem, first and foremost, revolves around dealing with their own conscience.

As trav points out, sometimes it better not to have a mass of people working flat out on a trailwork day. If you don't start the day with a plan of what you want to achieve then you either end up with people standing around doing nothing or trails being ruined by doing too much to them.

I think its better to have a small number of committed people volunteering because they love to, rather than a whole heap begrudgingly helping because they feel obligated to do so. Some people just love riding their bikes and they don't even stop to think about how much actually happens "behind the scenes"… they'll come around one day and put something into the sport.

 

[crank1979]

I think trail maintenance days need to be alternated more to cater to more people. And the use of trail maintenence guru's being spread out is also a great point that was brought up as it will obviously allow more maintenance days to be run. Some people work Saturday mornings and cant attend Loftus build days (I use Loftus as thats mostly referred to over on BMU). Start alternating the times/days and you will get a cross section of riders who will turn up and not just the same people over and over who have that time in their schedule frr every Saturday

Using Loftus as your example. Have you contacted the Ranger involved and asked him if it is possible to alternate maintenance days or simply complained about not being able/not wanting to attend?

 

[ando_assi]

I think its better to have a small number of committed people volunteering because they love to, rather than a whole heap begrudgingly helping because they feel obligated to do so. Some people just love riding their bikes and they don't even stop to think about how much actually happens "behind the scenes"… they'll come around one day and put something into the sport.

...and what happens if these people do not exsit in your area, i personly would love not to do any trail advocacy and ride trails that are up kept by other people, my passion is Riding not trail building, it is not a lack of riders in my case, i frequent one of the most popular trail networks in Australia, but 3/4 of it are in a really bad state, to the point were the trail managers are shutting down parts of it... how do i find people that are passionate and have the time? I figure the reason is that the MTB community are feeling unconnected.... how else do we as a MTB community get this resource back to a standard that the managers are happy with (let alone the MTB community) please let me know before we get shut out!!!! RB threads saying that MTBers should not feel like they should have to give back to the RESOURCE they share, does not aid my discussions with land managers, if i can get good numbers at trail days, these numbers prove to the land manager that there is a community that it is worth investing into!! So i figure if we all put in a little, it will be easy! but if you can tell me how i get a small group of people to volunteer the majority of the work (please PM me) other wise give back to your MTB trails that you enjoy.

 

[Nerf Herder]

Agreed, but that hardly the gist of the original post.

I disagree in that I see the OP is about changing culture, and the blog posts are about self justifying the current poor apathetic culture.

I see the blogs as justifying a lack of interest... and then covering this up with politically correct reasons. For example ... I could see every track with a club and every club with a set schedule and participation rates would still be low with the current selfish culture we have.

I agree with FR Drew's figure plucking ... and see the community in question is no different to other communities (although they do have even lower participation rates) So there needs to be a paradigm shift in the broader MTB community's attitude. I see that we shouldn't be justifying this attitude and saying thats its alright ... We've already agreed that it doesn't take much to participate.

So again, there is more to it then pushing dirt and rocks around ... and I see that we should not be encouraging this lack of participation and poor attitude, so if we need to be extreme in the short term in order to trigger a broader shift in attitude what else can we do ???. I say "No Dig ... No Ride" is a catch cry.

"No Dig ... No Ride" ... is a simple paradigm, that can be achieved in so many ways other then shifting dirt

"No Dig ... No Ride" in my eyes is multifaceted and not literal.
eg,
- You don't like our trail design ? and don't contribute to it ... "No Dig ... No Ride"
- You don't participate in any type of advocacy, whether front line or supportive via email participation, attendance at meetings or trail maintenance etc ! then "No Dig ... No Ride"
- You want to build illegal trails when we have just won legitimate trails around the corner "No Dig ... No Ride"
- You don't want to follow the code of conduct and continue to ride closed trails "No Dig ...No Ride"

"No Dig ...No Ride" should be a national anthem for the broader MTB community ... regardless of discipline ... You don't think you should help DHérs get legitimate trails coz you pedal ... "No Dig ...No Ride"


Apologies for the ranting on this and related topics, I actually didn't want to get involved in this, but the more I read, the more annoyed I'd get and I still can't believe he has more posts then I do ... then again, I do shite for the trails I ride.

"I Dig ... I Ride"

Fark I need a T-shirt quick.

 

[Nmag]

I think the dude expresses guilt for not building, and that he is most likely overestimating how much bitching goes on regarding people who don't assist in maintenance. I've been busy and have not been able to help maintain a local track so I got a carton of beer for the local build team as a thanks but they said to keep it and reminded me of all the good stuff I'd done previously. Offering, goes a long way. I'm just gong to drop it off at his house now, F him, he can have the beer!

My suggestion to the dude is, contact somebody. Ranger Grant or whoever and just tell him who you are and how you would like to help and cant be at build days, explain your skills and work and materials you have, or mates you know, or strings you can pull and maybe, just maybe Ranger Grant will have a little job for you. Maybe not right away, but he will appreciate the offer. Just offer.

 

[Dozer]

I can't agree with the "no dig, no ride" idea. I am all for encouraging people to learn the do's and don't's of building new stuff and maintaining trail but in my experience it is far easier to do the work with three or four good workers. There is nothing more frustrating than doing a solid job on a build day and have a few youngens talking shit and leaning on the borrowed rake all day. "Hey Dozer, how about we build a wall ride!" "Hey Dozer, we should make some north shore!"............... I value rider input but not after you've all agreed that the line you've nearly finished building is already being planned around.
When I arrange a build day I know I won't get more than three or four people show, sometimes having just one person other than me is a bonus. The thing that shits me most about planned build days is: NO ONE SHOWS UP. No one shows yet many criticise. That instantly drops you into the fuckwit category in my books.

 

[ido09s]

Using Loftus as your example. Have you contacted the Ranger involved and asked him if it is possible to alternate maintenance days or simply complained about not being able/not wanting to attend?

Have i, no i havent. Why havent i, because i dont want to blow smoke up the rangers ass asking him to arrange another time/day when i know i simply dont have the time to attend.

My circumstances will eventually change and when they do i will make an effort. How long will it take, i dont know....

 

[FR Drew]

While the wording of Nerf Herder's slogan "No Dig, No Ride" is maybe not quite what I'd agree with, "I'll care about your input once you start being part of the solution, not part of the problem" is a very wordy thing to try and put on a t shirt.

Being bitched at by folks who aren't putting anything in themselves is always going to piss advocacy and trail fairy folks off, that's a given. As long as we accept that we're doing it for our own reasons and not to make everybody else happy I guess it's something that I can live with.

 

[Slowman]

Both these threads are a waste of time

For those that don't want to do trail work don't and don't feel guilty about it for a second. We all contribute to our society in the ways we can so don't feel guilty or the need to justify yourself. It's just a labour listening to it as well.

For those that do volunteer and get self righteous about it, go and see a shrink, you've got issues The tired old guilt loaded question "who else will do it?" To which the implied answer is "no one else will do it, so I have to" is a nonsense. Rest assured if it needs doing someone will always step up, it is a bit like some individuals will clean the house before anyone else gets the chance to, consistently, yet without that individual around it still gets done.

Those that really understand and are passionate about advocacy understand this. They organise volunteer days, notify the general MTB community and are happy to see people volunteer their time and contribute what they can without feeling the need to disparage those that don't. They inspire, they don't bully, and they ask for help with humility.

 

[Nerf Herder]

My circumstances will eventually change and when they do i will make an effort. How long will it take, i dont know....

have you written a submission to the NPWS paper ? spent approx 20 to 30 minutes on the NPWS discussion paper website and added comments on it in line with your thinking of this sport and the topic?? ... pretty much like surfing a forum and posting on it? If not why not ? are your circumstances such that you are too busy for this ?

If you have then "You Dig It" and Thanks for taking the time.

Dozer ...
Whats easiest isn't always the best ... we need to all realise this before we can move forward.

FR Drew ...
Its more like "If you don't understand what is happening and or that you as an individual can contribute in so many different ways to assist the efforts of others, with as much effort and time as you have available... then you are not a complete rider" and IMO ... fuck off

A Complete rider is somebody that contributes in their way ... but in some form.

Now this is where I get buried in detail and impracticalities ... who defines the contribution ?? well its obvious ... we're fucked and I'm wasting my time.

Slowman
I disagree ... together we stand divided we fall ... your points perpetuate the current status quo, which IMO sucks.

 

[FR Drew]

SNIP

The tired old guilt loaded question "who else will do it?" To which the implied answer is "no one else will do it, so I have to" is a nonsense. Rest assured if it needs doing someone will always step up.

With all due respect, I'm afraid I don't agree. In many cases, despite people being passionate and wanting things to be done, no-one steps up, year after year after year.