Calling all mountain bikers, for the last month Lincoln Parks and Recreation has been seeking input as to new signage and trail usage in the park. If you haven’t yet read the master plan update and taken the survey, you only have until September 14 to do so. Go to https://lincoln.ne.gov/city/parks/about/wildernesspark.htm
“The primary goal of this project is the development of an annotated map to serve as a master plan for Wilderness Park that identifies user experience amenities and guides future improvements associated with the park’s trails, trail heads, wayfinding signage, parking lots, etc.”
The open house in the park was Sunday, but you can still go to the virtual open house on their website. Read the Lincoln Journal Star article for more information.
This year the number of people enjoying Wilderness Park has doubled, with more people wanting to recreate and exercise outdoors during Covid. With the soon-to-be-completed bridge connecting the train wreck trestle to the Rock Island Trail and Densmore Park, there will be even more. The survey wants your input about trail usage. Should all trails be open to every user; biker, hiker, and horse? Should they stay the same? Should there be a hybrid model? Opening them to all would greatly increase available miles of trail to each group, but horses and bicycles often don’t coexist well, and hoof divots make for an unpleasant riding experience. Let them know what you think.
If you would like to know more about Wilderness Park, particularly the old Epworth Park in the First and Calvert area, check out these links.
+ Jim McKee walking tour
+ Jim McKee starts talking about the Wilderness Park area at 16 minutes, Epworth Park around 33 minutes, he shows stuff you can find today around 50 minutes, and around 64 minutes he explains the arch
+ Epworth Park article
+ Rock Island train wreck
Finally, thank you Cindy Lange-Kubick for this fun bicycling piece. We almost rode it this past weekend, but life got in the way.