Can you hear the crickets?

From the November 2010, "Hoosier Motorcyclist" Magazine

Yep, it’s been quiet from the perspective of notifications and the like about ABATE/DIRT. Yet, don’t let that fool ya. We’ve been busy. When I say we, I mean those behind the scenes.

What’s going on?
1) DIRT regional representatives are being appointed.
2) Ideas have been put on paper as high level plans. They’ve been sent out for review and revised and put out for vote.
3) Government officials have been contacted and appointments are being made.
4) Notifications have been written, potential participants identified, meetings marked on calendars.
5) Educational documents have been drafted, reviewed and are back for re-write.
6) Grants application processes are being learned and written.
7) Web-sites updated.
8) …

What the heck am I talking about?
All the stuff you don’t see that goes on behind the scenes just to get an idea out of the gate. We don’t work in a vacuum and we are trying to get our feet ready to fly in 2011. We’ve got a lot of great ideas coming and all this RED-TAPE needs to be done before we can fly.

So, please bear with us as we get all the red tape out of the way in order to make 2011 one heck of a year for ABATE/DIRT!

LCRP UPDATE
Back in the first part of November DIRT held its first of many trail work days at LCRP. The November’s tail work day was to get the groups involved together and talking and to ride as many of the existing trails at LCRP with gps units in order to compose an inventory.

I’d like to publicly say “thank you” to the Indy Riders and American Trail Riders for coming out and working to better LCRP. It was great to see the two parties working together and discussing their needs.

What are we doing?
Well, we need to know where we are today and where we want to go. Now that we’ve captured where we are today (Squires nest of trails), we can start to work towards where we want to go. We want to turn LCRP into a showplace for Indiana ORV.
What I’ve heard from the meeting is the following: (in no specific order) 1) Get a majority of the trails marked(direction/vehicle types) before the Miracle Trail Ride. 2) Fix the access roads ASAP. 3) Create a kids friendly trail/section (bikes/atvs).

Why are we doing what we are doing?
We need a plan, this plan should help us outline where we are going, how we will get there and the monies needed for each of the projects.

Where will the money come from?
Grants, donations and volunteer hours.

The access road will require dozer work, new culverts installed, yet until we have a plan in place that outlines where/how this is to be done, we can’t do much. The reason why? We’d like to get it done and done right, the grants that can help pay for this work require an outlined project plan and constant updates on the progress.

From what I've heard, it seems as if both ATVs and bikes have trails in place they would like to keep and have marked. I did not know this before.

Yes, trail work can begin once we all agree on which trails are which and we all understand how we are to mark them and why. I’m going to refer to Roy Garrett and others to educate each of us so that there are not wasted trail markings and we all mark the trails in a standard way.

Also, we need to identify where the trails are, where the intersection points are so that we can properly sign them and know if we have enough signage available to us.

Signage:
The signage we are using follows closely the standards in place today here in Indiana and other states. Why? The major reason is to follow a standard is for education and when users come to LCRP from other states, they will recognize the signage and know how to read it, and Indiana residents using LCRP can learn the signage and be able to go to other parks and understand their markings.

Now, with all that said, where do we go from here?
We will develop a plan, so that we know where the trails are, where they intersect and based on that information we will identify if more signage is needed. Then we will schedule a work day where Mr. Garrett and others will educate us on the standard way we will be marking the trails.

We will continue to schedule volunteer work days and everyone will sign in. There are several reasons for this, legal and grant-wise. Indiana’s RTP fund/grant is a matching grant and volunteer hours count as matching. We need to know who/when/how many hours were worked so that information can be reported back to the state as we submit project progress reports.

What’s next?
Mr. Ed Sweetland is working to transpose the data collected into a set of paper maps that can be utilized for future reference and his volunteering to do this work is greatly appreciated. We will also be distributing the gps files (of the ATV and IndyRiders trail) so when we start marking, we can work off the gps files. We will be scheduling another working session once this information is gathered.

I know it seems like a lot of red tape, yet it is all needed so that we can eliminate what has been done in the past and so we can start working towards our objectives.

Please bear with us as we go through this, we are all working toward the same end result and we can all get there together.

Al Pivonka

Indiana Motorcycle Expo February 25 -27, 2011

2011 is going to be a new chapter in ABATE/DIRT’s history. The 2011 Indiana Motorcycle Expo will be one of DIRT’s first public appearances as ABATE/DIRT and we need your help. In the past, only a very few manned the booth during the expo and we want to change that. In order for us to kick off 2011 with a bang we need your help, your enthusiasm and your presence at the expo to help get the word out.

What do we need?
You, your presence, your enthusiasm in the booth talking with as many people as you can. The Expo runs from February 25 – 27th and we need you to sign up to man the ABATE/DIRT booth a couple of hours that weekend. Here’s the schedule for the weekend: Friday 25th, 1 pm ­9 pm; Saturday 26th, 10 am ­9 pm; Sunday 27th, 10 am ­5 pm.

If you have an hour or two to spare that weekend and are going to be in town please give the state office a call and ask that Edie Seiler put you on the list to help with the ABATE/DIRT booth, and the hours you will be available on which dates. It’s that easy.

Thank you in advance.

Al Pivonka

DIRT Calendar of Events 2011
February -- Motorcycle Expo, Indiana State Fairgrounds Boat, Sport and Travel Show
March -- DIRT Adventure Ride
April -- DIRT trail work days, 1st & 3rd weekend
May -- Miracle Trail Ride at LCRP Ride on the 21st and Race on 22nd
August -- MotoGP/Enduro-Cross
September -- Hoosier Outdoor Experience, Fort Harrison, Indianapolis
October -- DIRT Fest at LCRP, 2nd weekend
November -- DIRT trail work days, 1st & 3rd weekend