Our parish would like to provide a pump track/skate/scooter track for the people to use and have fun.
I have been tasked with trying to get the ball rolling with progressing the project.
The cost looks to be in the region of £40K (Phew) and the biggest turn off of me is when the graffitti mob gets hold of it and then makes the area look generally shit.
I was thinking mostly Recycled Ttpe Agg and Tarmac berms and do it ourselves. But the liability issues kicks in 🙁
Also, we have some land sent aside the District Council says we can use. So thats one major hurdle over with.
Anyone here led a campaign to development or have some hot tips of what to look out for.
Or "For....ged About It"
PS I there any track designing software out there for the PC that people may know of? Usung Motocross MAdness 2 Track editor and Far Cry 3 Editor at the moment, along with Google Earth.
Braunton Pump Track
Jump to about 8:50
I'm not fully sure how they funded it but you could do worse than getting in touch with the people that got the one at Chopwell Park built. They had Velosolutions build it so it's a properly designed one.
Didn't WCA manage to get something similar down near him?
Try: Neil Morrison <neil@socialtrack.co.uk>
Neil says:
Pump tracks in the last few years have really evolved. They use tight radius turns and flow, it takes a lot of skill to be able to shape them. It also takes a great eye to make lines work and flow into each other.
If you have a look at the Hawick, Wishaw, and Cathkin pump tracks they all have features that are heard to explain to people who don't have experience riding, scooting, and skateboarding. However within these cultures we have our own terminology that lets us explain ideas easily to each other.
The builder needs to understand how people build speed and maintain momentum around a pump track.
How to get a Pump Track in your parish
Assassinate all those in the parish over the age of 60 for a start.
Anyone here led a campaign to development or have some hot tips of what to look out for.
Or “For….ged About It”
Step 1, get yourself and some likeminded friends voted onto the Town Council.
Step 2. Go on about the lack of facilities for kids endlessly, have no pride, just talk about it it all the time
Step3 after a couple of years, get one of you elected to the finance committee. and find out what they spend their money on and where funds for a pump track can be found.
Step4 Hold they rest of the Town Council hostage (not really) until they agree to your demands. In our case, once the track was built we'd all go away and they could have their Town Council back again.
Step5 get track built.
Step6 go back to normal life.
Didn’t WCA manage to get something similar down near him?
Yep, worth a chat.
Re- graffiti/vandalism. It hasn't happened to the Hilsea one... And if it doesn't happen there, I can pretty much guarantee it won't happen anywhere! 🙂
Interesting document, with some pumptrack designs -
I will say though, that was to get a skateboard bowl and ramp, and it was covered in graffiti after about 6 months. Last I heard it was all knocked down (it lasted 11 years though)
Velosolutions are one option, other contractors are available.
https://www.clarkkentcontractors.com/
Also Farmer John (of the bike park) builds them as well, said he'd been out to Czech republic or some far flung place to build one at one point.
That should give you a good range to get quotes from.
As for graffiti, one mans vandalism is another mans art. Better on the concrete than random walls IMO but if there isn't a problem already then it won't just create one.
In vaguely related news:
https://www.walesonline.co.uk/news/wales-news/trade-centre-wales-mark-bailey-20703590
How not to oppose a skatepark and get a whole city upset at you.
We have a skate park in the village and a pump track in the next suburb, neither seems to attract a disproportionate amount of graffiti.
My 2 tips:
1) Phone up Clark and Kent, they're the masters of BMX and pump tracks.
2) Have a beer and watch someone else build it.
3) if its not tarmaced then ensure there is ongoing budget for resurfaceing. This will probably only need a few bulk bags of material a year and some voulenteer hours. But if neglected an eroded lip becomes a pothole, becomes an unusable pump track and a waste of the initial investment.
This is what we got:
IIRC the cost was £155k but that included an outdoor gym as well which is a much bigger area to surface, and equipment bought etc so I don't know how much >£40k the track cost. But give C&K a call and see what they can do in the budget, if be surprised if £40k doesn't cover it.
Have a look at what they did in Rhayader.
I believe Clive Powell was involved from Elan Cyclery. The track there is brilliant
Late edit: it was just under £70k. But it's AWESOME! Maybe a case for getting them to build something smaller, and then putting volunteer hours into a line of progressive tabletops?
Assassinate all those in the parish over the age of 60 for a start.
Don't make **** bigger than it is.
I spent a bit of time last year building this kind of thing for Biketrack - did a bit on the Sutton Bank pumptrack and a month near Banbury building a skills loop and a strider bike/scooter/beginners pump track.
The Banbury thing was interesting as it was entirely community driven and they had a really active community spirit - the backstory was that they'd had a payoff from HS2 going past their door and they'd ploughed the money from that into a new village hall, and upgrading the playground and sports facilities the tracks were part of. Every Friday they had a brunch morning which most of the village seemed to turn up to, and there was an active roadie gang (mostly retirees) who went out twice a week and some of them were on the village council and driving the bike track project. They did a lot of the land clearance and tree thinning for us over the weekends.
I have a feeling there won't be an issue with grafitti as a result of the village inclusiveness and general pride.
One thing I would say about projects like this - think about ongoing maintenance costs. It's much more expensive initially to tarmac everything from the word go, but after that it just needs the edges strimming to keep it neat. If only the bigger berms get the black stuff, you'll be getting a team in every couple of years to reclear the line, reshape the jumps and generally give it a good fettle, at a good few grand a go by the time you've got 2 or 3 guys for 2 or 3 days, a digger, a dumper and a few wagons of material etc. (I spent most of Nov & Dec doing exactly this)
PM me your email address I and I can send my copy of Pump Track Nation to learn the basics.
You can pay someone to do the work for you if you have the funding. We didn't have funding so the Southampton Bike Park is basically self funding with less than £200 sedd money from me to get it going.
It isn't too shoddy. All hail Louis Arnold, builder of bike parks : https://www.youtube.com/southamptonbikepark
I've a contact at archtrail velosolutions who do a lot of council ones.
Happy to put you in touch.
[i]Late edit: it was just under £70k. But it’s AWESOME! [/i]
Just for perspective, Southampton Bike Park has been going 10 years now and has cost less that £1,000 and most of that was wheel barrows, shovels, food and drink for the builders
Our village is building a small one now by velosolutions.
I think british cycling gave a grant that paid for half of it. Give them a bell.
There was some fundraising, and some money from parish rec fund.
Write to councils that have done one to ask if they will share their success.
I wrote to john.kennett@hart.gov.uk (Head councillor for Hart which is Fleet pump track)
He put me in touch with their PM who was REALLY helpful... invitations to councillors etc. and success stories and value to the whole community...
Graffiti needs something to paint on - minimise signs and other tempting targets and it shouldn't be an issue.
As others have said, vandalism doesn't seem to be an issue with pump tracks, luckily.
Fleet put a grafitti wall up ....
[i]I wrote to john.kennett@hart.gov.uk (Head councillor for Hart which is Fleet pump track)[/i]
I only hear good things about this place
I only hear good things about this place
What they did with the budget is amazing and still they have 50% remaining (but have to do a skatepark as well yet but included parking and some other stuff and the pump track itself not just dirt) and another 2 lines on the jumps.
One of the most amazing things is people our age learning.
One thing to consider though is a pump track is ruined for use for others by a single parent. Fleet works because if a parent decides to push their kid the wrong way on a balance bike or tricycle (or last time electric car) you can just piss off over to the dirt jumps.
Other places its essentially a write off weekends and holidays... We've been to another one near grans a few times and after 30 mins to get ready and go not been able to ride...
Wow. Thanks everyone for the thoughts and input. Making a note of everything here 🙂
The council is onboard already.
Many thanks.
RT
@worldclassaccident YGM.
For funding try National Lottery, lots of hoops to jump through, any large companies nearby that might want there name on a piece of community infrastructure.
Irrespective of party, get your MP interested, they carry a lot of weight locally.
Another thumbs up for Velosolutions. For transparency we make the signs for them! They are a great bunch to work with and will have the all the funding angles covered. They work anywhere!
Just noticed who the op is. That’s cool, I could ride there at lunchtime! Wooohooo!
One thing to consider though is a pump track is ruined for use for others by a single parent. Fleet works because if a parent
Same for Skateparks. "Let's go to the skatepark and use the ramps as slide" or "let's just leave little Johnny to ride around without watching him as he rides I over to the base of the box jump landing"
Sent you the documents plus the initial proposal for Southampton Bike Park.
Doing it on the cheap like we did is a lot of hard work and a lot of hard shovel work but so rewarding. One of the things I have done that makes me most proud when I go over and see anyone from pink princesses on push along bikes to pro-riders doing YouTube movies there
Some arty farty projects do classes in graffiti, which are usually attended by the local kids. If you can offer them walls/surfaces to graffiti you will get better graffiti, plus probably find them being protected by the kids themselves.
I know a chap in Glasgow used to run a course in this, and the work was also nice(not that im any sort of judge, I just know him and knew he ran courses for local kids projects in art.
We've just got the go ahead for one in our village. Funding secured, residents on side, all systems go. Do me a message for details. I want heavily involved but can give some pointers from experience.
Check local council spending budget. We found that they had a pot for older kids but no idea what to build. We applied had a meeting with convener and other high hied yins and walked away with an eyewatering amount of money.
Also as above mixed surfaces will need maintenance.
Also lights our were pricey but it was used all through winter. Although you might want to reduce the extra wear and tear caused by winter riding.
Same for Skateparks. “Let’s go to the skatepark and use the ramps as slide” or “let’s just leave little Johnny to ride around without watching him as he rides I over to the base of the box jump landing”
Yep and I think that's part of the plus for Fleet... it does of course still happen but there is somewhere/thing else to ride. That said I'm not one to normally interfere but I have been tempted to suggest if they are pushing little johhny the wrong way round the pump track in an electric car it might be a good idea for them to have a helmet to minimise the damage to their brain when one of the teenagers doing 360's lands on their head.
I'm hoping the new lines will have compulsory gaps which should discourage parents from pushing little johnny down the DJ's or perhaps they could just do a roller line?
Either way its really good, just annoying to turn up and not be able to ride when its quite a trek and the format seems to encourage lots of different ability use compared to pump track only places.
One thing to consider though is a pump track is ruined for use for others by a single parent. Fleet works because if a parent decides to push their kid the wrong way on a balance bike or tricycle (or last time electric car) you can just piss off over to the dirt jumps.
Other places its essentially a write off weekends and holidays… We’ve been to another one near grans a few times and after 30 mins to get ready and go not been able to ride…
I've not done much pumptrack riding, but we briefly managed to get away last summer to the Alps, and although I didn't have a bike with me (!!) we came across this when at the skatepark with my lad:
@46.0278957,6.633983,3a,75y,90t/data=!3m8!1e2!3m6!1sAF1QipML1sRaL4ts4WzmqCvnB4J49jYUuiQovNjLYiDA!2e10!3e12!6shttps:%2F%2Flh5.googleusercontent.com%2Fp%2FAF1QipML1sRaL4ts4WzmqCvnB4J49jYUuiQovNjLYiDA%3Dw152-h86-k-no!7i4608!8i2592!4m8!1m2!2m1!1sles+carroz!3m4!1s0x478c018ede735acb:0x768f9e65b0b6d66c!8m2!3d46.0278957!4d6.633983">Les Carroz Pumptrack
It looked great and had loads of different lines so the littlies could pootle up and down without necessarily getting the way of more serious riders.
It looked great and had loads of different lines so the littlies could pootle up and down without necessarily getting the way of more serious riders.
This is I think an oft overlooked point...(I see they have a skatepark right next to it as well)
I think one of the successes of WCA's place and Fleet is they consider someone will want to push little Johnny round and there is sod all you can really do to stop it.... (unless its patrolled which opens another can of worms)
Must go back to Southampton btw ... last time I was there Jnr scratched my stanchions putting the bikes in the car alone after I broke my wrist...
Brokenm wrist to teach you a lesson about riding better. Scratched stantion to ensure you remember the lesson.
It is the only way to learn 🙂
I tried for one locally but didn't pull it off (yet). One of the things that suprised me was that there is no centrally held body of information to tap into so we can use it to demonstrate why we need one.
Neither Velosolutions or Clarke and Kent had this info, neither did OpenMTB.
I contacted lots of pump tracks/bmx tracks and got some information. Is this something that Cycling UK might be able to do if we all fed them what info we have?
Brokenm wrist to teach you a lesson about riding better. Scratched stantion to ensure you remember the lesson.
It is the only way to learn 🙂
Scratched stanchion was a brilliant excuse to buy new forks 😉 ... then repaired the others and they are still in use on his mothers bike 🙂
Broken bones are usually a good excuse to get my camera out... something I rarely have time to do.
Riding better ... think it's a bit late at my age 😀
We were planning on another trip with Jnr's mate who is local but his mates Mum can't ride again for a few weeks yet... (broken ankle but at least she did it on the bike ;D even if it was the daftest "on the bike")
Mugboo
I tried for one locally but didn’t pull it off (yet). One of the things that suprised me was that there is no centrally held body of information to tap into so we can use it to demonstrate why we need one.
Fleet were gushing with it... their PM told me their original business case (youth anti social) was completely blown away by the additional benefits and seems naive now they did wider benefit studies.
The council were more than happy to share with other councils... (we are pretty close so perhaps more so)
Timing was a bit bad for us... our ex council were being investigated and this took over plus first lockdown... but Fleet (Harts) were really happy to share their experiences.. (obviously gives them lots of kudos but they deserve it)
I started finding the newspaper article from the opening and the councillor opening it... wrote an email full of praise (not difficult) and he quite honestly got back and said "I was just opening it but please speak to our portfolio mgr" ... I sent another flowing praise email them and they asked the PM to send details and invited our councillors.
I'd imagine a similar approach would work well with must successful council pump tracks!
I did the whole bike park in an electric wheel chair when I snapped my foot off, she will be fine. Plus the pub is open doing food and drinks.
Anyway, glad you like it. I have tried to keep the variety up and everything rolleable
