Biking group gives trails a refurbishing

By Bob Ruegsegger
Correspondent

CHESAPEAKE

Under a gray sky and with a light drizzle falling, organizers of the Eastern Virginia Mountain Bike Association's Southside Crew began their work.

It was Trail Day clean-up at Indian River Park last Saturday. While the weather was a bit forboding, the mood of those volunteering to clean up the 90-acre park wasn't dampened.

Members of the Eastern Virginia Mountain Bike Association have been contributing to Indian River Park's maintenance through the Adopt-A-Park program.

"It is a way to promote community involvement in maintaining and beautifying our parks," said Ray Wharton, the manager of the city's Parks and Recreation Department.

This crew consists of EVMA members who live on the south side of Hampton Roads Bridge-Tunnel. The association's headquarters is in Williamsburg.

"In EVMA, we do a lot of trail work on the Peninsula. This is one of the only places in the south side to ride trails of this nature," said member Michael Munford.

This year's challenge was improving

pedestrian and bike passage through a low, muddy area in one of the primary trails.

Wooden pallets placed across the soggy area in an effort to alleviate the problem decayed, exposing nail heads.

"That's not good for the bike tires and not good for people who walk through the park down there," said Munford. "We've got to get these pallets out of here, but it's a muddy spot."

Munford and his associates cut up some downed trees into four-foot logs and sliced the log segments in half. They replaced the old pallets with the lengths of split logs to form a walkway of natural material over the muddy morass. That solved the immediate problem - at least temporarily.

"We're trying to do some regularly scheduled maintenance. Cleaning up the park and picking up trash, and cleaning up the creeks to improve water flow," said Munford. "We cut up trees to clear the trails when they fall across the trails. We make trail improvements and also rake and clear leaves from the trails to clean them up."

Members of the mountain biking group enjoy riding in Indian River Park because of the interesting terrain.

"This park is the only park [in the area] that has elevation changes. That's why we like it so much," explained Michael Buff. "It is in a flood zone so it does get wet sometimes. We love it. It's a great place to tune up a bike."

Even before the clean-up began, Buff emerged from the wetlands wearing hip waders and dragging a trash bag full of assorted non-biodegradable debris like bottles, cans, plastic and Styrofoam containers that were washed into the area by runoff from recent rains.

"I couldn't sleep. I had all these things in my mind about what I wanted to do. I woke up at 6:30, came out here, and started picking up trash," Buff admitted. "It's all volunteer work. We've got a big group, and that helps out. They're itching for some new trails, and we're working with the park rangers to get a couple of new trails out here in the Chesapeake area."

Occasionally, members of the local community - such as Rogard Ross - follow their example and pitch in during the Trail Day clean-ups.

"I think they're doing fine work," Ross said. "They deserve great kudos for the work they've been doing for all of these years."

The city supplies necessary materials in addition to the dirt and gravel needed to fill in low spots in the trails, plus bags, paint, brushes, gloves, rakes and shovels.

But volunteers often use their own tools - chainsaws and leafblowers - to cut up logs and clear trails.

"Ray Wharton said we are what the Adopt-A-Park program is all about," said Buff. "He's had people come and go. They'll adopt a park, and six months later they just vanish. We're not going anywhere, that's for sure."

Bob Ruegsegger, bruegse@yahoo.com