BikePark Wales: New 33 year lease to bring many benefits

Amidst reports of job cuts at Natural Resources Wales (NRW), it’s good to see some positive news coming from Wales: BikePark Wales has signed a new 33 …

By stwhannah

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BikePark Wales: New 33 year lease to bring many benefits

As someone whose main interest in this news is that I love riding at BPW rather than the re-wilding this all sounds great.

Chairlift soon then?
Smiles, possibly Winks.

Chairlift soon then?

I’m wondering whether the ‘nine new climb trails’ are to be of the type that are fun on an ebike or just necessary to link up all the new downhill trails.  I wouldn’t want to be trying to guess how ebikes are going to impact the uplift side of things over such a long lease.

As someone whose main interest in this news is that I love riding at BPW rather than the re-wilding this all sounds great.

I mean it’ll never happen but there must be the outside chance that other conservation groups with land see this and think that maybe having trails on their land could be a positive thing?!

I was there the other week and you can see work has started on the new car park already. This is fantastic new for both Wales and mountain biking. A great place with great staff and just a brilliant day out. Well done BPW.

Chairlift soon then?

I think it’s unlikely.

If you watch/listen to the Ride Companion Podcast with the founders of BPW, there wont ever be a chairlift. A couple of million to install. Regular servicing means downtime, and if the weather is crap, you cant use it. They also mentioned it would cost about 1 million to tarmac the road. but they are looking at alternative surfaces. Was a really interesting podcast.

But back to the subject at hand… this is great news. I love what BPW does. Despite visiting once a year at most. Good on em.

I wouldn’t want to be trying to guess how ebikes are going to impact the uplift side of things over such a long lease

I live pretty local and have an ebike season pass – if they put in a chairlift and my season pass was for the chairlift rather than just access, I’d have a new DH bike tomorrow and be up there 3 times a week! (But I appreciate that’s just me)

v7fmpFull Member
If you watch/listen to the Ride Companion Podcast with the founders of BPW, there wont ever be a chairlift. A couple of million to install. Regular servicing means downtime, and if the weather is crap, you cant use it.

Yet ski resorts seem to cope with these challenges absolutely fine? Seems like weird excuses since chairlifts have been an established and successful invention for decades.

Great news about the rest of it though, it’s such a brilliant venue.

Not sure they do manage absolutely fine – they are a bottomless pit for running costs, but whilst there is snow, they make a small fortune due to the numbers opf people skiing. MTB is a much smaller number so far less money to make from punters (and we all read how many folk don’t like paying for just car parking!).

Skiing has far more money in it so costs are more likely to be ‘manageable’, but as we’ve seen over the last couple of sessions in Scotland, with numbers down, things aren’t as rosey for them either…

Suspect ebikes are going to have a major impact (for the worse) on climbs (from what I’ve seen and witnessed – hopefully this is the minority)…they just speed up erosion and a number just don’t seem to bother about how they are ridden (which also helps speed up erosion). Plenty of ebike riders do seem to be considerate, but many aren’t. Saying that suspect the trail design will take that into account as ebikes are now incredibly popular.

Yet ski resorts seem to cope with these challenges absolutely fine? Seems like weird excuses since chairlifts have been an established and successful invention for decades.

You may have noticed there are two shoulder seasons where networks are shut down and lifts serviced.

eg

Maintenance work on the Le Châble – Verbier line – Verbier4Vallées (verbier4vallees.ch)

Props to BPW and the NRW for partnering to create sustainable recreation. Chairlifts are easily the most sustainable way to access the top of the hill. Maintenance and operating cost concerns are overblown: more than a dozen small, even community or cooperatively owned, ski areas with chairlifts operate throughout the harsh winters, many in the eastern USA. Some of these also serve MTBs.

Yet ski resorts seem to cope with these challenges absolutely fine? Seems like weird excuses since chairlifts have been an established and successful invention for decades.

Winter season funds the lifts in ski resorts. Summer season barely breaks even and is very limited.

I suspect that ski lifts, like gyms, are largely funded by People who pay but rarely use the facility.

Yet ski resorts seem to cope with these challenges absolutely fine? Seems like weird excuses since chairlifts have been an established and successful invention for decades.

the weather is quite different in south wales to alpine resort and have you seen the price of a week’s lift ticket?

Ski lifts are never going to happen like others say, too expensive to install and maintain, what they need is a funicular, i’m sure there’s a barely used one for sale in Scotland!

As for ebike erosion, we’re talking about BPW, they create and maintain stuff for a living, whatever gets eroded will be fixed pretty quick, it’s not like a concern about a well used local trail counting on trail fairies to maintain.