Crowdfunder for uplift bike park in Notts.

Forgive my cynicism, but Nottinghamshire isn’t exactly known for its elevation differences…

And linky no worky

Good luck to them but in the age of the ebike I can't see small venues being able to offer a financially viable regular uplift service.

Working link.
https://www.crowdfunder.co.uk/p/bike-park---nottinghamshire
Nope. Can't get the link to work.

£500,000 needed <shocked face emoji>

Forgive my cynicism, but Nottinghamshire isn’t exactly known for its elevation differences…

This is true. We've worked out where it is, and it looks like it drops from about 125m to 70m

https://www.crowdfunder.co.uk/p/bike-park---nottinghamshire

It's a long way down the Google results

Forgive my cynicism, but Nottinghamshire isn’t exactly known for its elevation differences…

Pit tips?

I don't think there's a county in the UK that couldn't have a decent bike park, just look at Twisted Oaks for what you can do with a very little hill so elevation gain shouldn't be an issue.

You can do loads on a 50m hill. But I find it hard to believe that loading a bike onto a trailer and being driven back up will be that time efficient for a hill that size. I think it takes about 5 minutes to cycle up 50m, even for a slow old man like me

Or are they doing something higher tech than vehicles

Got to agree with the above after spending a lot of my formative years riding around Nottinghamshire.

Trail centre? Go for it.
Uplift? Seems unnecessary for 50m

Can't see a working link.

If it's a drag lift or a travelator I'm in. If it's a dirty diesel truck and shonky trailer I'd rather pedal up.

One of the listed jobs is for drivers, so reckon it’s a van & trailer.

As above, I’m sure they’re can do plenty with what little elevation there is, I just don’t see the uplift being an attraction that many would pay for, especially if they are on an ebike. Unless you have to pay for it in order to use the rest of the park?

Yeah another trail centre would be great, uplift not needed.

Redhill used to have an uplift for a 4x track, it actually worked really well and made complete sense. A good uplift will always beat riding but I think quite a few venues don't have the most efficient uplift service any more.

The way the uplift route goes slightly out of the park boundary and back in suggests it will be going up a public road?
No hopping on a hay trailer clutching your bike, this will be proper strapped in, minibus territory.

£500k to launch someone else's profit making business? Which presumably is because a bank doesn't agree with the business model, or the owner won't / can't put thier own money down?

Hmmm

£500k to launch someone else’s profit making business? Which presumably is because a bank doesn’t agree with the business model, or the owner won’t / can’t put thier own money down?

It works for Alpkit! 🤣🤣🤣

If I was closer I'd chip in, might chip in anyway. If/when it's up and running I could see me and mini me using it, they are too small for BPW and the like but find the boring up 30 seconds down of smaller trail centres too dull.

I've just seen this on a local Facebook group, the idea of an uplift for a 50mtr hill seems ridiculous to me and it's been suggested that an uplift pass will be £30-35 and a pedal pass will be "cheaper". How does that compare to other bike parks? It's not the kind of riding I'm interested in but seems like an expensive day out to me.

£30-35 is cheap in uplift terms.... But only if it's pretty damn good.

Blimey so many negative waves. The East Midlands is desperate for something like this and it can only be a good thing - worth chipping in I say. Even if the uplift is not viable, in 5 years I can see the light e bike market being massive and places like this will be very popular.

I am absolutely up for the uplift idea.

My local woods are about 100ft (elevation) top to bottom. Sure, I can ride to the top, and I do because I have no other choice. But if I wanted to spend a day there I would really have to spread my runs out so I didn't fatigue too quickly. As it is 2 hours of riding fairly hard down then back up and I'm toast.

Can't afford an ebike, so a similar place with longer trails and uplift just 20 minutes extra drive away means I am sold on the place. It's a great idea.

My local woods are about 100ft top to bottom

I'm hoping that's a typo and there's a "0" missing.

I’m hoping that’s a typo and there’s a “0” missing.

Nope, 100ft elevation is all we have, and there are some cracking trails in there.

The first person in the UK * who susses out how to use a recycled drag lift/button/chair onto a medium sized hill for mountain bike purposes will clean up. This makes far, far more sense than another bunch of filthy landrovers/transits bouncing up and down a fire road.

* The generally populous bit, so Fort William etc is not really what I'm talking about. And it doesnt need to be anywhere near as big as a huge mountain side gondola. Think about the 'free' slopes you get at the bottom of nearly all Ski resorts, often its a t-bar or button that doesnt even need manning, doesnt go fast, but it allows you to do endless laps of a reasonable bit of hill all day long.

snotrag, agree, would work at any of the southern bike parks, forest of dean, qecp etc.
My only issue with uplift is that I think Ebikes are killing it.(edit - everyone else has said this, I should really read more threads, the auto end of thread link think is a good/bad thing)
We did FOD uplift  a few months ago and there were literally hundreds of ebikes there.
Edit - Note FOD is "only" about 40m drop and the uplift is a great thing, the descents are excellent. In fact you only really need a small gradient to have loads of fun. Top of FOD is very gentle gradient but is also brilliant So the height thing is a total red herring. .

They experimented with this at Sheffield Ski Village, I think the results were its possible but not great, I imagine its also difficult to secure when the park is closed.

My only issue with uplift is that I think Ebikes are killing it.
We did FOD uplift  a few months ago and there were literally hundreds of ebikes there.

There's, handily, no way to ride back up in that plan linked 😉

There’s, handily, no way to ride back up in that plan linked

Clever.

Nope, 100ft elevation is all we have, and there are some cracking trails in there.

I don't doubt that at all - one of my local spots is similar, 30-50m elevation on 2-4 min long descents.

But it takes less than 5 minutes to climb 1km with 50m elevation, and 3 minutes to climb 30m. In 2 hours riding it's fairly easy to get in 600+m and 20km.

But, there's no way an uplift is required for 30m or 50m of elevation gain. By the time you've waited a minute for the van, took another minute loading up, then taken the long way up the hill, then unloaded you'd have already got to the top.

I wish em well, hope they can pull it off if they think that's what people want. I do think the uplift is ridiculous for a 50mtr hill but I'd be much happier if it was something more innovative and sustainable rather than an old mini bus chugging up and down with a trailer.

Pointless and overly expensive both in terms of crowdfunding and uplift pass.

Never gonna happen.

Went to a bikepark in Slovakia a while back that used a button lift.
A friend just couldn't get on with it, with hilarious consequences 😂

Great system for a small hill though.

Edit – Note FOD is “only” about 40m drop and the uplift is a great thing, the descents are excellent.

Pretty sure the main push up/climb is 100m/300ft at FOD.

That's about right as a minimum for an uplift IMO, when I rode at Aberfeldy that climb is 155m and took around 15 mins. I was thinking if I lived there and wanted to either get a days riding in or wanted a quick hour after work, an ebike would be ideal.

Blimey so many negative waves. The East Midlands is desperate for something like this and it can only be a good thing – worth chipping in I say. Even if the uplift is not viable, in 5 years I can see the light e bike market being massive and places like this will be very popular.

I would like to remind you of Sheffield Ski Village trails.

Once a Steve Peat endorsed, crowdfunded idea:

Proposals were huge:
https://singletrackworld.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/sheffield-ski-village-to-receive-22-5m-redevelopment/

Time, costs and Covid interrupted and it is now:
https://www.28dayslater.co.uk/threads/sheffield-ski-village-july-2019.120114/

Interestingly the work at Lady Cannings and elsewhere was much lower cost, led by volunteers and seems to have hit the mark and sustained without a business running over the top of it.(I am no longer a Sheffield Local, perhaps others can better comment on this).

I think my summary is that urban and local, easily accessible trails are great.
Building a profit making business from it, less easy.

I've worked out where it is, and from google street view it barely even looks like a hill. I know you can get decent rrails with not much elevation but an uplift would be overkill, especially if it just going up the road.

Hope it works for them in some form though, as it's not far from where some of my family live, so would take my son there if the pedal up price wasn;t too silly.

I’ve worked out where it is, and from google street view it barely even looks like a hill

Link?

(To me it sounds like someone has a parcel of land in mind, but hasn't the money to buy the land and so want's it quiet before someone beats them to it...)

Blimey so many negative waves. The East Midlands is desperate for something like this and it can only be a good thing – worth chipping in I say. Even if the uplift is not viable, in 5 years I can see the light e bike market being massive and places like this will be very popular.

Aye. "We want more trails....but not those type of trails"

I don’t doubt that at all – one of my local spots is similar, 30-50m elevation on 2-4 min long descents.

But it takes less than 5 minutes to climb 1km with 50m elevation, and 3 minutes to climb 30m. In 2 hours riding it’s fairly easy to get in 600+m and 20km.

But, there’s no way an uplift is required for 30m or 50m of elevation gain. By the time you’ve waited a minute for the van, took another minute loading up, then taken the long way up the hill, then unloaded you’d have already got to the top.

All well and good, for you. You are clearly fitter than me. Because two hours with that amount of elevation is not 'fairly easy'

So it's not about the time, it is about the fatigue that comes from repeatedly climbing back to the top and how that impacts riding down the trails again. For winch & plummet riding getting assistance to the top is the difference between an hour and a half vs a full day out. I'd like to go and spend six hours on the trails, but that's just not going to happen.

Yea I know, easy answer, get fitter.

Link?

(To me it sounds like someone has a parcel of land in mind, but hasn’t the money to buy the land and so want’s it quiet before someone beats them to it…)

I didn't think it was fair to give away where it was, if they're being open about it.

That is a fair point...

Pretty sure the main push up/climb is 100m/300ft at FOD.

According to my strava its 129m... Oops.
I'd still be happy with 40m uplift.

I am of the opinion that they are being coy about location for a number of reasons.

Currently it's not used much based on strava viewing. I expect they want to keep it that way.
I also suspect they will need some planning permission, and it is probably a lot easier to do so if they have a good amount of backing and public support before shouting to the locals about a new bike park
It may also be a stipualtion of the landowner that it is not public until it is 100% going ahead.

It's taken me about 5 minutes to find the location, not being a local and only with basic information (shop location, and picture of the woods).

There's not many bits of wood on hills there, so not exactly hard to find!

Looking on OS maps they could have about 75m elevation which would probably make it worthwhile but if that was me I'd not be betting on the uplift side being doable/worth it. Build in a good, interesting climb trail. Because there's a sodding road climb literally right next to/through the wood that is 1km long and 75m of elevation.

1km long and 75m of elevation.

5 mins to ride even at my pootling pace?

5 mins to ride even at my pootling pace?

Bit more, at bimbling place and able to do it 5-10 times in a day.

There's a local climb to me that's 0.7km and 75m, it's a granny ring grinder most of the way up, times for me are 5 mins to 7 mins. Top 10 on Strava is sub 3 mins.

They need a lot of high quality trails to justify buying an uplift pass, if there's not a days worth of riding there it's not going to be great value.

Now, granted - where it is, is in quite a desert of any sort of decent riding - Sherwood pines looks to be the closest actual "mountain biking".

Good luck to them, I hope the half a mil target isn't going to see the project dead before it even starts.

Maybe they should look at the recent Dunoon project, get some established trails in there first and get people riding there regularly then look at getting the costly infrastructure.

You only need 5 or 6 enduro trails to make it a decent little riding spot.