Wildcat Flow Trail

WFT Lives On!  At the August 5 Board meeting the main event was consideration of staff's request for Board approval to proceed with the CEQA study for the WFT.  The discussion took nearly five hours in part because a few opponents used distortions to rally about 30 people to make public comment opposing the trail.    As we told the Board, we could have brought in a hundred people to make public comment but we respect the Board's time.  Instead we sent an email prior to the meeting documenting the nearly 2400 signatures supporting the WFT along with endorsement letters from the local NorCal Teams, BTCEB and Rich City Rides.  A representative from the Sierra Club endorsed continued study of the WFT; a complete turnaround from its previous position made possible by our efforts in last year's Sierra Club elections. Some of the most influential pro-WFT comments came from six NorCal students who patiently waited for about 4 hours before they had a chance to make ...

EBRPD is briefing the Board on the WFT at their August 5 Board meeting.  Here is the link: https://shorturl.at/qD9NH.  Staff will be asking the Board to approve the next step of doing an Environmental Impact Report as part of the CEQA  (California Environmental Quality Act) for the project.  The presentation includes a brief history of the WFT,  summarizes the considerable amount of work that has been completed on the project, provides some details about the actual trail itself including bike-specific features being planned, describes environmental mitigations (minor), etc.  

At its Aug 5th meeting  the Board will be considering whether to continue progressing the Wildcat Flow Trail.  If you have not already done so please click on the "Petition" button on the home screen of this web site and s ign the petition  and get your friends to sign it!  The broader the support we can show for the trail the better the chances the EBRPD will approve it.  Also, please take a few minutes and write an email to the EBRPD Board before Aug 5th.  To get directions on how to do this click on the "Email Sample" button on the home screen of this web site.

The Phase 1 CEQA report should be finalized any day now.  EBRPD Staff is expected to present the results to the Board sometime this summer who will then decide whether to fund a Phase 2 study which would likely include further environmental reviews as well as stakeholder meetings.  We'll keep you posted on the date as this will be a critical vote.

In March, Park District staff gave an update to the Board on the “WIldcat Regional Park Bike Trail Project”.  In the meeting materials here and video here (starting timestamp 1:42) staff showed the identified trail corridor, which provides access for local youth mountain biking programs with minimal impact to sensitive plant and animal communities.  Importantly, Brian Holt, Chief of Trails, Planning, and GIS, stated that there are no internal planning hurdles since the Wildcat Canyon Regional Park Land Use Plan specifically identifies mountain biking as an appropriate use. Also in March,a preliminary design of the Wildcat flow trail (WFT) was completed by Pointe Strategies (a Colorado firm specializing in design of mountain bike trails).  The trail, shown in the map below, is about 2 miles long and drops 700 feet (both the distance and the drop are roughly 3x that of  the Endor Flow at Tamarancho).   The flowy part of the trail is broken into three sections su...

In October, EBRPD completed contracting with a private consultant to develop a preliminary design of the flow trail.  Work should be completed early in 2024.   In another major step forward, the  EBRPD Board of Directors in December followed the recommendation of staff and approved $300 k to fund the CEQA for the Wildcat Flow Trail.  This is the next step in the normal progression of any significant project and represents a major commitment by EBRPD.  Part of the CEQA process consists of public hearings.  The first such meeting will focus on gathering public input on the preliminary design resulting from the study mentioned in the first paragraph.   In short, we are making slow but steady progress!

 WFT is making major strides forward.  EBRPD has initiated a study to develop a preliminary design for the flow trail which should be completed in time for the 2nd public meeting to discuss the WFT which will happen in the early fall.   In other positive news, the EBRPD Board held an annual workshop on July 21 in which each Board member listed their top priorities for the EBRPD to pursue in the coming year.  Both Colin Coffey and Elizabeth Echols voiced strong support to continue the WFT studies.  Coffey even went so far as to state that he would like to see  5 more MTB-focused trails added to the parks in the next 5 years.