The Banff National Park Management Plan 2010, the main guiding document for Parks Canada administrators implementing and developing policy for Banff National Park for the next five years, was tabled in Parliament and has now officially come into being. The BVMBA made a few submissions to the Plan review committee and we are pleased to see a number of suggestions we made have been adopted. With this we feel the "near future" of mountain biking in BNP has a number of bright prospects and we would like to see all mountain bikers share in this improved direction for our sport.
The whole document is available on Parks canada's website by following this link
Some of the gains we see for mountain biking, and cycling in general, from the document are as follows:
improved cycling access to the Lake Minnewanka Trail from Banff by the creation of a one-way loop road to Lake Minnewanka that will see a bike-lane being developed to improve rider safety on this road
the Tunnel Mountain bench trails will be formalized and maintained by our Alliance and other trail volunteers under an agreement signed by Parks Canada
there will be improved cycling safety with the Legacy Trail's opening and trail connectors to it
a new mountain bike trail in the Lake Louise area, once indentified and approved by Parks Canada, will replace the Temple Road trail we agreed to stop using to protect grizzly bear habitat and increase bear and human safety in the area
as a general philosophy in the Lake Louise area, Parks Canada will consider the approval of new mountain bike trails where these trails will help to dissuade the use by mountain bikers of non-designated and informal trails
The BVMBA would like to thank the dedicated volunteers who put the thought into the submissions given to Parks Canada, took the time and made the effort to write the submissions and who care enough to be pro-active in making improvements to the future of off-road cycling in the park while always being sensitive to the environmental concerns that our sport either may potentially create, or is perceived to create, in particular areas of the park.
