Hello everyone. If you get out riding anytime soon you will notice horse prints and manure on over 10km’s of the County’s Cycling trail network. The trails were ridden either late Sunday or on Monday and the Wheel Hill has now seen repeated use as it was ridden and “pruned” on Friday. The wheel hill is now fairly damaged from the equestrian traffic. This use seems intentional as they would of passed over 15 County By-law signs in the process of riding these trails so I doubt it was an accident.
Some have seen this as interesting timing…there was just an OCTRA event this weekend and the trails where ridden immediately before and after their event. If you didn’t know better you may think that this occurred during the OCTRA event. I want to assure everyone that this in not the case. OCTRA members have all shown tremendous respect for other users, the County and the Forest.
Please continue to show respect for fellow responsible and respectable users no matter what their discipline. If you happen upon an equestrian on the Cycling trails, please inform them that they are on a County designated Cycling trail and please make notes in order to describe them and identify them to the County. No need to engage, just report. There are many equestrians justifiably equally upset about these occurrences as this reflects very poorly on the entire equestrian community and they will be watching for them as well.
Everyone has been working very hard at educating and communicating with each other in order to build respect and understanding between user groups with great success. Please continue to facilitate these relationships despite the actions of a few non-respectful equestrians as they do not represent the majority of the equestrian community utilizing the County Forests.
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