Hornsby Shire Mountain Bike Alliance

In Dec 2009 there was much debate about whether Council should progress with the investigation of mountain bike trails. The main cause of the debate was the reaction of conservationist groups to the World Trail report. Emergency meetings were held, fliers spread around the shire and people flooded Councilors with pleas for Council to appose any further work on mountain bike trails. A scare campaign indicated that the Blue Gum High Forest would be cleared with tax payers money, no more wildlife and to act now as it was your last chance to stop the destruction! 6 people spoke against the motion at the Council meeting. The bizzare thing however, was that Council were only voting to essentially investigate further. This means looking into funding and environmental assessment of the proposed trails. Following this it would go to community consultation. So the reaction from the green groups seemed a bit of an over reaction. We obviously have a lot of work to do as it would seem that there is a HUGE knowledge gap between conservationist groups, councilors and the facts about mountain biking trails. HSMBA also spoke at the meeting. Although the original speech based on education about the numbers involved and the huge need was changed to one more about the misunderstanding of mountain biking. Anyway, the vote was YES.