More and more trail systems nationwide are considering allowing class 1 pedal-assist e-bikes on their non-motorized singletrack or have already given the green light.
Well, we can now add Park City, UT, to the list of areas that once said “no” to e-bikes and may soon make some changes. A new proposal from the Park City Council may reclassify several sections of trail to allow for pedal-assist bikes.
However, not everyone is excited about adding another user group to some of the trails in Park City. Of course, the proposal for adding more e-bike-friendly trails is much more complicated in Park City than it would seem to be in other places facing similar changes.
The proposal from Park City’s City Council
It is uncommon to hear of a City Council proposing adding a user group such as e-bikes to local trails. While this may seem somewhat strange, it becomes even more unusual when you realize that the proposed trails that would see the addition of e-bikes are on private land.
A trail system on private land is typically an e-biker’s dream, as the landowner ultimately approves whether to allow pedal-assist bikes. However, when it comes to Park City —and more specifically, Deer Valley Resort — things get a little tricky.
“Currently, e-bikes are banned in Park City singletrack backcountry trails,” Steve Graff told us. Graff is the Vice President of Operations for Deer Valley Resort. During the winter, Deer Valley has over 2,000 skiable acres of land that will grow to around 5,000 in the coming years. When the snow melts, the resort has over 70 miles of mountain bike trails on its property and three chair lifts to get riders close to 10,000 feet.
According to the Park City ordinance that Graff shared with us, e-bikes can be ridden on soft-surface trails with a width of 5 feet or greater. For many, that sounds more like a bike path than the traditional singletrack many eMTB users are seeking.
The situation in Park City gets even more difficult to understand, as the city’s ordinance does allow the use of e-bikes on singletrack trails if the user is 65 or older and/or has a mobility disability.
As if that wasn’t complicated enough, Graff explained that while e-bikes are not allowed on Park City’s singletrack, they are allowed on neighboring Deer Valley’s trails. “Deer Valley has a trail system that is private, and if you’re a Deer Valley customer, you can use an e-bike,” Graff said.
This use of e-bikes on Deer Valley trails is only extended to paying Deer Valley customers. Because of its proximity to Park City, Deer Valley also has many trails open for the public to access, regardless of their status as a resort customer. In these cases, however, the public use of private Deer Valley trails does not allow for riders to use e-bikes, in order to stay in line with Park City’s public ordinances.
In hopes of bridging this gap, Park City approached Deer Valley to see if there were trails they could open to e-bikes for both public and resort customers. It seemed that Park City wanted to give the e-bike user group a more traditional trail experience outside of many of the bike paths and doubletrack that were currently open to e-bikes.
“I was approached by Park City’s Trails and Open Space about if we’d be willing to designate an e-bike trail and work with them on something that would be willing to allow e-bikes on,” Graff said. The proposed trails — Little Stick, Deer Crest, Pipeline, and Village Trail — are already established and make a roughly 5-mile loop.
But most people don’t want e-bikes
Many in Park City, however, would like to see the brakes pumped on allowing e-bikes on more trails. Lora Anthony, Executive Director of Mountain Trails Foundation (MTF), wants to make sure e-bike trails are actually what the public wants.
According to the data she shared with Singletracks, the public is not asking for the addition of e-bikes to trails.
“Mountain Trails is not opposed to e-bikes — we’re building e-bike-friendly trails as fast as we can,” Anthony told us. In fact, Anthony shared an MTF newsletter with us, which explicitly states that MTF supports adding e-bikes to the select trails in Deer Valley. However, the group does have some concerns.
Among MTF’s concerns was that Park City had no plan to keep e-bikes from encroaching on neighboring trails. MTF also stated that the city has no plan for measuring the success or failure of allowing e-bikes. However, perhaps the most significant concern MTF shared in their newsletter was that the “results of the recent e-bike survey indicate that about two-thirds of the respondents are not supportive of a change in the current ordinance.”
“The majority of Park City mountain bikers — and hikers, who are the larger trail use group — do not want to see the ordinance changed prohibiting e-bike use on singletrack except for those 65 and older or with a mobility disability,” Anthony told us.
The data Anthony shared with Singletracks was taken from an e-bike survey that took place between March 1st to April 1st of this year. In that one-month time frame, 2,228 people participated in the survey.
While the survey encompassed all matters pertaining to e-bikes, we were especially interested in the portion that focused on eMTBs on trails. While the survey also included a neighboring recreation district area — Snyderville Basin — we focused our attention on the Park City data.
All told, 68% of respondents in Park City were happy with e-bikes staying off the city’s singletrack trail — except for those who are 65+ and/or have a mobility disability. Of that 68%, 50% “strongly support” the current ban, while 18% “somewhat support” it. 66% of Park City respondents also stated that they would support additional resources to enforce the current e-bike ordinance.
Coincidentally, only 16% of Park City survey participants said they have ever ridden an e-bike on a singletrack trail. But that opportunity could be coming sooner than later.
“I think [Park City] Trails and Open Space is currently working on getting the signage out,” Graff told us as we ended our conversation.
Hopefully, it is a change that Park City is ready for.
7 Comments
Jul 26, 2024
Jul 26, 2024
Jul 26, 2024
Especially on trails that hikers assume are not bike-legal. Then I have to do some educating. ;)
Jul 27, 2024
Jul 30, 2024
Jul 29, 2024
Jul 26, 2024
Narrow minded people do exist. They would rather that person that had an aorta transplant be left with being a bloody bench warmer. Or, that person that is recovering from cancer treatment, remanded to some boring ass hanging out...
As the one that is recovering from chemo and marrow transplant, this type of people rekindle the desire to buy a dirt bike and enjoy the multi use areas that offer opportunity instead of hinderance.