Location for Penticton Skills Park?

There is a discussion going on at Pinkbike about what section of land we as a club might look at applying for with the City of Penticton or the RDOS, with an eye towards future development of a Penticton & Area Bike Skills Park. Discussions have introduced Campbell Mt., Hobo Jungle and the Duncan St. water storage lands. I'm sure that there are a lot of other areas that we haven’t considered; your input is requested!

Andrew D.

Read in today's paper (Dec 4th 08'), that the new Penticton First Nations land chief is young, energetic and open to all kinds of economic incentives with regards to use of their land and interactions with the community of Penticton. Following the model of the Kamloops Bike Ranch & Tours (all of which, from what I can tell, is situated on First Nations land), and improving upon what it might lack - this might be a great time for someone to involve themselves in negotiations with the First Nations community with regards to this kind of project locally. Link to article below:

http://www.pentictonherald.ca/top_story.php?id=151182&type=Local

I've included a blurb about the setup in Kamloops below:

The Little Shuswap Indian Band has provided KBC&T with exclusive use to 6,000 acres of private land. KBC&T has subsequently built 40 km of downhill and freeride trails and 50km of cross country single-track. The informal arrangement gives KBC&T creative freedom to build trails and TTFs on the property, in exchange for user fees from the riding operations. The lands are adjoined by the Quaaout Lodge, also owned and operated by the Band. KBC&T offers packages in conjunction with the lodge.

A setup where the First Nations had two dozen, 6" travel, 30-ish pound 'all-mountain', bikes to rent out, a small repair station, a trio of quality tour-guides, some major cleanup and modification to the MANY trails on their land - and I don't just mean the stuff around Separatist / Unity / Rebellion / Hell's Gate and the others near the trestle.

These basics, along with a lodge situated on or overlooking Skaha, Okanagan or both lakes... would be an excellent example of a 'Win-Win' situation! One of the additional bonus's of building on First Nations land is that one can circumnavigate the general adversity shown by regional and provincial governments toward technical trail features; AKA: jumps / ramps / skinnies etc.

Hell, guys are currently spending time building stuff on reserve lands as it is... why not get paid for their materials and efforts?

Andrew D.

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The City has a concept drawing for the Duncan ave Reservoir, there are a couple inherent problems with the site. it is relatively small, there is a serious bottleneck behind the concrete no post barricade. This bottle neck will make it difficult to link the upper parkland to the lower section, this could be overcome by building retainment $$$ or cantalever over the edge. I think this site could be good overall with the slope and size. I would consider this a good starter location.

The other spot that could hold some potential is the old dumpsite near the Carmi substation/ into the open gravel pits etc. this is not City land so could be harder to get agreement for use.

The Munson mountain properties are a potential when the City develops that area, generally flat lands but im sure we could get imaginitive on it.

Campbell mountain has a large potential, but once again this is not city land so property agreement may be difficult.

Somewhere in the Mice would be nice, but a innercity plot would be better.

Todd,

Thank you for the input. Duncan Ave. is a no-go. I attended a meeting with the parks and rec. committee two years ago and they informed me that the Duncan spot was dead in the water due to its proximity to residences immediately above and below it.

The Mice would be great, but is too far away and offers no parking lot, nor the ability to build one as long as the fellow who owns the grazing lease on the land is in place.

Campbell Mt would be perfect as we have loads of parking, paved access, a great many established trails on the land as well as a downhill and banked track. I'm not 100% clear on exactly who owns what parts of the mountain as a whole, but think that the city must have a hand in it as when I called city-hall and inquired about getting them to assist us in cleaning up an old car in the area they offered heavy machinery right away. However, when I suggested that we would like to consider cleaning up the Carmi XC area parking lot and trailhead, they balked and simply stated that it was RDOS land and out of their jurisdiction...

If anyone reading this would like to speak with the city directly and clear up the question of land ownership - that would be great. I do know that the top 100 meters or so of land above and surrounding the old trailer-park / golf-course (now gone) on the south side is private land – and is now signed as “no trespassing” – because dirt-bikers going up and down there buggered it for the rest of us…

Andrew D.