Welcome

[Shaggz]

This is a forum that I have been wanting to put together for some time. We should all be mindful of access issues, and our responsibility to ourselves as mountain bikers to ensure that the trails we have remain open to us in the future.

As most of you are aware, we would not have all of the access and great trails to ride on, if it weren't for the hard work of the folks at JORBA (www.jorba.org), and all of our collective volunteer hours. With that in mind, we asked JORBA Vice President, Frank Harms (gt2brew) to help us moderate this forum. Frank conducts himself as a 6' 5" 250 pound gorilla on the board, and he seems even larger than that real life !

While some of you may not always agree with the methods being or the speed at which things sometimes take, to secure our rights as trail users, please be open minded to what is being done. Additionally, history has shown that it is not only MTBers that read these boards to monitor our activities and actions, so please consider how your words may be perceived by someone outside our community.

 

[walter]

Great idea Shaggz!!! It will be nice to have a specific forum to keep us up to speed on the stuff thats taking place.

One question, if Frank(gt2brew) is this forums mod, what color is his name going to be, red or blue? Or will it be a combo of the two, or maybe just purple?

Great job!!!!

 

[Shaggz]

Thanks, Walter. I was considering using a color schema once referred to by a certain "Third Party", but figured that would get me tied into a pretzel :rofl:

 

[Frank]

This is a forum that I have been wanting to put together for some time. We should all be mindful of access issues, and our responsibility to ourselves as mountain bikers to ensure that the trails we have remain open to us in the future.

As most of you are aware, we would not have all of the access and great trails to ride on, if it weren't for the hard work of the folks at JORBA (www.jorba.org), and all of our collective volunteer hours. With that in mind, we asked JORBA Vice President, Frank Harms (gt2brew) to help us moderate this forum. Frank conducts himself as a 6' 5" 250 pound gorilla on the board, and he seems even larger than that real life !

While some of you may not always agree with the methods being or the speed at which things sometimes take, to secure our rights as trail users, please be open minded to what is being done. Additionally, history has shown that it is not only MTBers that read these boards to monitor our activities and actions, so please consider how your words may be perceived by someone outside our community.

Great stuff Shaggs, and thanks. But just to set the record straight I'm only 6'2" tall:rofl: .

But seriously thanks for letting us get "the word" out to all mtb'ers.

 

[Frank]

Thanks, Walter. I was considering using a color schema once referred to by a certain "Third Party", but figured that would get me tied into a pretzel :rofl:

I've been practicing with balloon animals

 

[jdog]

Nice.. I like!

I have seen the total non-fun background stuff that is needed to keep mt biking going in NJ. I will thank these guys a million times for doing the political dancing that I don't enjoy so much. With some local success at six mile I see first hand how fulfilling it is to make a difference legally on a local trail system.

Having attended some trail days with 25+ people on hand, it seems that we as a group have the momentum to make NJ the best it can be for mt biking.

This could easily not be this way.

Good stuff all around.


J_

 

[Frank]

Sadly we have to remember that trail access in NJ is a privaledge, not a right. I have had many conversations with "bandit" trail builders that say "it's public property" and continue on their merry way. But when the :hitsfan: JORBA has been the ones who try and rebuild the trust with the land managers. For the most part JORBA has been successful in that area, adding new chapters, and have increased volunteerism just in this past year alone. JORBA will try to keep this great momentum going. We will continue our work throughout the winter, showing the land managers that the cycling community does indeed care about our trails and are willing to put in many hours of work to keep them in great shape. JORBA will also return to Washington DC again this year to lobby for cyclings rights. As Jdog said, there is a lot of negotiating that goes on behind the scenes and JORBA will continue to be there for the mtb community. JORBA is growing in numbers and we are well on our way to becoming NJ's unified voice for trail access. We owe that all to you...thank you for your support

 

[mergs]

I want to thank Shaggz, Jake and Norm for putting together a specific forum to talk about advocacy and access issues. This is an excellent addition to this site and I think ultimately it will be helpful to the cause. Like shaggz said, it all starts with an open mind and an open dialog.

JORBA is 100% volunteer organization. All folks here that are chapter leaders and/or are JORBA staff do this because we love bikes and we love trails. We also love NJ but that goes without saying.

We all spend a great deal of time talking, strategizing, digging, thinking, re-thinking, digging, and then we try to squeeze in the rides, time for the spouse, kids etc. We don't do it because we gain anything materially but we do gain a lot of pleasure out of advancing our sport, improving the riding ops in NJ and meeting new people of like minds along the way. I personally feel like I've met some lifelong friends from within JORBA and that is not something you can say every day. So there are rich rewards in mountain biking advocacy if you have the wherewithal to get involved. Consider this a gilded invite to help.

I invite all of you to get as much involved as you can. This can be coming out to trail days, volunteering for JORBA events, or becoming a member of JORBA ( or all of the above! )

However, we all have busy lives so we only ask that you do what you have time for, and what you can afford.

In the coming weeks I will begin making some announcements on JORBA.org and here. I hope that the posts can be informative and may spur on more volunteerism amongst the riding community. I also hope that as you all begin to know us, understand us, that you'll want to become more involved. We also hope that you'll consider contacting us when issues arise so that matters can be dealt with in a diplomatic fashion, before they spin out of control. We are usually on first name basis with the land managers and we can bring items to their attention and try and get improvements made/problems solved.

That said, again... we're volunteers so please understand and be mindful of that. All of these guys that are running trail crews are putting in at least twice as much time prepping for trail days as the days themselves, so pat em on the back. Sincere thanks never gets old. Finally, understand that we're trying very very hard to make NJ a better place to ride. We may make a mistake along the way but in the end we intend to achieve good things for our sport. But we can't do it alone... it does take time and your help to acheive this. Please, consider volunteering if you can, and joining JORBA if you are able to... you might just meet some new riding buddies and make a few life-long friends.

 

[NMBPmike]

Thanks, Walter. I was considering using a color schema once referred to by a certain "Third Party", but figured that would get me tied into a pretzel :rofl:

I SAY MAKE IT RAINBOW. :rofl::rofl: