Making Trails in the West Virginia Hills

Rarely do the east and west Subaru/IMBA Trail Care Crews get to cross paths to work on a project together. We hope their guidance will spur a future full of roller coaster trails in West Virginia.
With newfound knowledge from IMBA's Trailbuilding School, the work party heads out to reclaim a fall-line trail and construct a full-bench, contour reroute.
Darrell Brown, president of the River Valley Mountain Bike Association, works side-by-side with Scott and Mark on the trailbuilding "chain gang." Many thanks to Darrell for organizing an outstanding weekend full of trailbuilding, riding and West Virginia hospitality.
Lora examines the final product, a 150-yard section of full-bench cut trail that will handle high traffic with minimal maintenance. In addition to completing this new section, the enthusiastic volunteers also fully reclaimed the old trail.
Their labor done, the IMBA folks enjoyed a ride with the River Valley Mountain Bike Association on trails at Mountwood Park, a 15-mile trail system developed, maintained and patrolled by RVMBA.

As the autumn leaves took on rusty hues, both Subaru/IMBA Trail Care Crews headed to the beautiful Mid-Ohio Valley in West Virginia. IMBA teamed with the River Valley Mountain Bike Association (RVMBA) to work on a trail system at North Bend State Park near Parkersburg.

IMBA's visit brought together land managers from West Virginia State Parks, Ohio State Parks and the West Virginia Trails Coalition for a hands-on Trailbuilding School. Crew members Scott Linnenburger, Aaryn Kay, Lora Woolner and Mark Schmidt shared their tricks of the trade, demonstrating how to build exciting and sustainable singletrack for all levels of mountain bikers and other users.

The park already boasts 10 miles of singletrack and rail trail, which connects to the 72-mile North Bend Rail Trail. The developing trail system is one piece of a statewide plan to connect all corners of the state with multi-use singletrack trail. Governor Bob Wise recently commended the West Virginia Trails Coalition on the development of this plan, predicting the trail system would make West Virginia the "trail destination" in the eastern U.S.

Want to help? The WVTC needs vocal support from all trail users to persuade the legislature to fund this initiative. For more information on how you can support this effort, check out www.wvtrails.org.