Walden Hyde is working with the International Mountain Bicycling Association (IMBA) to better serve mountain bikers.

Because you ride bikes on trails, we want to know more about who you are and what you care about. And, we’ll make it worth your time by entering your name in a drawing for an IMBA kit or IMBA T-shirt!

Click this link to begin … and thanks for your thoughts. We really appreciate your help and your time.
– See more at: http://www.waldenhyde.com/mtb-survey/#sthash.oLMPkrU3.dpuf

One of our board members (Charlie) was on site for the ceremony and created this video to share the experience.

We received this message from Tina Hugg at Openspace.org to SVMTB

” I’m happy to announce that we just received approval from San Mateo County to open the parking area and trail to the public.  Both will be open this Friday, February 21^st.  We are testing the automatic gates over the next couple days and getting the site ready for the opening.                        

The staging area has 63 regular parking spaces, 2 accessible parking spaces, and 4 equestrian spaces.  It also has a double stall restroom, sign boards, tire cleaning station, and shoe cleaning station.  There are several stormwater basins around the site, two of which have special bioretention soil and new plants in them to help filter pollutants from the runoff.  These have been partially fenced off so that the soil isn’t compacted by foot, hoof, or bike traffic, which would diminish its infiltration capacity.  The trail that used to connect Gate CM04 to Gate CM03 has been permanently closed because of a new basin, and it has been replaced by the new Sierra Morena Trail segment that connects the parking area to Gate CM03, Gordon Mill Trail, and the rest of the trail system.

We hope everyone enjoys this new amenity.  We know people have been waiting for the staging area for a long time, so we thank everyone for their patience.”

The final vision plan meeting for the Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District was held on January 14th.  On Wednesday January 29th, Board of Directors approved the associated 40-year Vision Plan, which includes a slate of 25 tier-one regional open space projects ranging from opening preserves and building trail connections to improving water quality, protecting the coastline, restoring forestlands, and creating wildlife corridors in an increasingly urbanized region.  A complete list of the approved Vision Plan Priority Actions can be found at www.openspace.org/imagine.

Thanks everyone for your participation in the Midpeninsula Region Open Space District’s recent Vision process. Our voices were heard through workshop participation and a lot of on-line input – great!

The Midpeninsula Regional Open Space District has finished their regional workshops, but it’s still possible to send input via their website.

Midpen has identified several goals for open space preserves, based on input gathered over the past eight months. These goals are taken into consideration when deciding what actions, activities, projects, and programs are top priorities for preserves.

On their website you can rate these goals according to what is most important to you,  They ask that we review all goals before rating them, and not rate each goal the same – it’s important to convey which goals are more important than others:

• Love it! = This is a top priority for me!
• Like it! = This is a priority for me, but I have higher priorities.
• It’s OK = I see how that can be important, but it is not a high priority for me.
• Neutral = This is not a priority for me.

In addition to overall goals there are proposed projects that you can also give input on.  Some of the projects have a mixture of component – you can add comments to clarify support for specific parts of a project.