East Bradford Township
Mechanical Trail Building Workshop
May 13, 2009 and May 14, 2009
East Bradford Township has a pretty substantial trail network. One property in particular (the 238-acre Harmony Hill Nature Area) is especially interesting because we’ve partnered with volunteers (hikers and mountain bikers) to construct all the trails on the property by hand. This effort started in 2007 and since construction started, approximately 100 volunteers have worked a total of ~400 man hours at the property. Many of the volunteers attended IMBA trail building clinics.
However, this year, we have two long and challenging trail segments scheduled for construction and hand construction is just not feasible/reasonable. So, we’re pursing mechanized construction. We’ve hired Trails Professional Chip Kneavel (Infinite Trail Concepts) to train some of our staff to build sustainable trails using a machine (Ditch Witch SK 500 w/ a 6-way blade). (Chip is also the Trail Crew Field Operations Manager for the DE Division of Parks and Recreation; he has designed and constructed trails at White Clay…if you’re familiar with those trails.)
Chip is comfortable instructing ~10 people, so we decided to open the training up to others to help us offset our costs. I expect that the training will consist of ~4 hours of class room style instruction to cover the basics of trail design (IMBA standards). The remaining of the training will take place at the Harmony Hill Nature Area with hands on experience using the Ditch Witch and blade.
Good afternoon –
I wanted to provide a few updates relative to the mechanical trail building workshop scheduled for May 13 and May 14…
o Thanks to those of you who have confirmed your attendance. For those of you who have not confirmed and plan on attending, please let me know.
o The workshop will start at 9 am on each day and training will conclude around 5 pm.
o The Township will provide lunch both days.
o Participants will meet at the East Bradford Township building (address below) on Wednesday May 13. The meeting location for Thursday is TBD.
o In the event of significant rain, we will reschedule the event for two days in June (currently, June 10 and June 11 are under consideration – but that’s not final). To find out if the training is cancelled, you can call me on my cell (484-880-7314) the morning of May 13.
o Next week I hope to distribute Chip’s PowerPoint presentation for the “class room” portion so that everyone can review it in advance of the 13th.
I hope I’ve answered some of your questions. Again, if you want to discuss this further, please do not hesitate to call me.
Mandie Cantlin
Assistant Township Manager
610-436-5108
MCantlin@eastbradford.org
| Attachment | Size |
|---|---|
 MechanicalTrainingRegistrationForm_042709.doc | 53.5 KB |