completed by contractors

Yeah thats the problem though isn’t it? Bringing in external contractors to complete work that could be done by a more volunteer based workforce means that stuff increasingly rarely gets done. I think the approach FC has taken with the contracting out of trail maintenance will be the death of a lot of trails. Competition for funding within the organisation/risk management etc. will combine with higher costs of any work because they’ve subbed out all trail development to create an unwelcome situation where FC can’t/won’t let the volunteers do it, but also won’t be able to stump up the cash for whatever reason to get it done themselves.

gil_, I’ve definitely seen Singletraction working on the new run at Dixons on several Sundays.
You seem a bit tense about this – do you work for the FC?

I presumed he meant they didn’t build the World Cup course 😉

gil_, I’ve definitely seen Singletraction working on the new run at Dixons on several Sundays.
You seem a bit tense about this – do you work for the FC?

If this Gil is the Gil that I know from the area he has a full understanding of the ins and outs of local cycling.

Not suspension forks though, please.

Why not? The original RC35’s were market leading, the RC40’s I had in 2006 were comparable to any I had for a good 8 years after and the Pace based DT XCM’s I rode still up there with the best forks I have owned.

Saying that, the skill left when Duncan was ‘retired’ and what has come since has been underwhelming IMO. I certainly wouldn’t take the current mob’s version of events as gospel.

Bringing in external contractors to complete work that could be done by a more volunteer based workforce means that stuff increasingly rarely gets done

The contractors they use have had previous trail building experience or at least have built landscaped paths, the work alongside the national operations guys, they know what they are doing ~ The only thing holding them up is funding and man power to oversee it once it’s complete

As for expecting volunteers to bench cut trail, and then bring in materials to surface it, that would take years…

I’ve definitely seen Singletraction working on the new run at Dixons on several Sundays.

You definitely have, they recently undertook the project of developing what was the “skinnys” the wood had rotted and was dangerous, for the last 18-24 months they have been working on an extension of the pump track, this is now complete and they are working on trail maintenance.
10-12 guys turn up and work bloody hard, they should be given more credit

You seem a bit tense about this – do you work for the FC?

Most definitely not, I have worked with SingletrAction for over 10 years in the forest, I know the in’s and out’s of it and was one of the group of 3 people who initially planned the “red route”
I just like to play both sides of the story rather than people believing the first thing that is said ~ There are 2 sides to everything

Gil was(is?) a prominent Dalby SingletrAction volunteer when I was last over there on a dig 4 or 5 years ago (I’m not active now, but I still pay my SingletrAction subs), he’s def not an FC/FE employee. He was there from the start of the Dalby trail development many years ago, also with A.Carter of Pace/Dalby Bike Barn.
Don’t know any detail, it’s all a bit of a shame that it didn’t work out, but Gil taking a holistic view is fair enough.

My impression of FC/FE Yorkshire wasn’t that great (Wharncliffe, Stainburn) re bike trail development when I compared to what FC/FE North West were doing. However, it just seemed to be simply down to lacking any really enthusiastic MTB centric individuals such as the likes of FC/FE NW’s Martin Colledge who was instrumental in the development of Gisburn Forest.