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Trails for 2012/2013 Season


AkronOrange

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What is the plan or rumor for trail openings/closures for the coming season? Manitouwadge, "C" to Shining Tree, Longlac, "F" through D'Ville, etc., that we can report here. Will there be any changes from last year?

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It sure would be nice to head north from Elliot Lake and take the F trail towards D'ville and Wawa again.

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How about the D from the Sault to Wawa. A lot of us in da States would really like to resume riding this stretch eh!

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Without halfway it will be tough. Suppose to be working on a plan b. Have to wait and see.

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With predictions that permit sales will be nosediving...a lot of clubs will have to cut groomer operations this year. Don't expect miracles.

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heard no halfway, no grooming betweeen wawa and the soo again this year. they are hoping someone buys it, for possible future re-opening of that trail. Ski

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At the current price no one will buy it. So we are out of luck. The longer it Is closed the harder it will be to re open too. Man this sucks.

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The young people don't even want to do physical labour, never mind running a resort in the bush.

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What is the plan or rumor for trail openings/closures for the coming season? Manitouwadge, "C" to Shining Tree, Longlac, "F" through D'Ville, etc., that we can report here. Will there be any changes from last year?

I noticed that District #16 is no longer on the interactive map and all of the trails connecting to other districts are gone. A few still show, but are not part of a network. The contacts are gone from the OFSC site and listed as "TBA" I guess that means "To Be Announced".

I am keeping my fingers crossed and hoping they show back up on the map.

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I noticed that District #16 is no longer on the interactive map and all of the trails connecting to other districts are gone. A few still show, but are not part of a network. The contacts are gone from the OFSC site and listed as "TBA" I guess that means "To Be Announced".

I am keeping my fingers crossed and hoping they show back up on the map.

This all very disturbing, the middle of the end. We can no longer get to Hillsport and Longlac. I wish there were more that had the passion for touring. I have a 2010 sled with 5000 miles, all of those were done in Northern Ontario, this may me the last sled I will have purchased. In situations like this, everyone loses. Hope I make it to 500 posts here.

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The touring network is falling apart. Alot of people can't afford to tour long distances anymore. The north has low trail permit sales, very few helping hands. Miles and miles of rough terrain to prepare, groom, etc. South has had very weak winters. Not a good combination. As long as central Ontario gets winter this sport will live on for awhile.

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I noticed that District #16 is no longer on the interactive map and all of the trails connecting to other districts are gone. A few still show, but are not part of a network. The contacts are gone from the OFSC site and listed as "TBA" I guess that means "To Be Announced".

I am keeping my fingers crossed and hoping they show back up on the map.

D16 is history.

Very sad.

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I noticed that District #16 is no longer on the interactive map and all of the trails connecting to other districts are gone. A few still show, but are not part of a network. The contacts are gone from the OFSC site and listed as "TBA" I guess that means "To Be Announced".

I am keeping my fingers crossed and hoping they show back up on the map.

D16 will not show on the map again unless some thing drastic happens and the locals start buying permits again. There just is not enough people there to justify the trails.

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This is very scary indeed. I don't want to hijack the thread or start another argument. But I will stick to my opinion (posted here 2 years ago) that the trail permit sales are "nose-diving" because they are too expensive. Ontario (and Quebec) have some of the nicest trails in North America... but it's really hard to justify (up to) 4x the cost versus alternative locations like Michigan, NY, and Maine.

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This is very scary indeed. I don't want to hijack the thread or start another argument. But I will stick to my opinion (posted here 2 years ago) that the trail permit sales are "nose-diving" because they are too expensive. Ontario (and

Quebec) have some of the nicest trails in North

America... but it's really hard to justify (up to) 4x

the cost versus alternative locations like

Michigan, NY, and Maine.

It isn't the cost of the permit that is the problem. It is cheap for how Many miles of trail we have. It is all of the other costs that add up. You can use 400 dollars in fuel easily riding one week in Ontario and yet you want the permit reduced. If the permit costs did go down, the permit sales wouldn't go up enough to cover the expenses either. Sledding is expensive and if it wasn't for alot of hard working volunteers we would be all riding ditches and roads. The insurance premium has to be paid for the liability of the trails, whether we get snow or not. We have 340 groomers that need to be maintained and insured, loans on them need to be paid etc. 210 bucks for a permit is cheap. We should all be glad to pay it and volunteer to help make the system more stable. There is going to be cut backs because of alot of riders are switching to two up sleds to cut costs. I ran into lots of couples last year that are now running one sled instead of two. Ok rant over, just tired of hearing the permit is too expensive.

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That's sad news about D16, which I unfortunatley predicted last winter. As I've said before, it is very hard for the locals up here to justify $200 + for a permit that lets you on a trail that only goes away from where you live. Where I live in Nipigon, the trails were all linear. It was not possible to do a nice loop ride that didn't take 3 - 5 days, so our only option would be to ride a couple hours one way, then turn around and go home on the same trail. Ok once or twice but pretty boring pretty quick. We quite nturally moved on to crossovers and made our own fun running unplowed logging roads, hydro ROW's & pipeline corridors. Buying permits to use the trails occasionally and to access the logging roads was ok for most of my buds when the price was $150 or less, but once it got past that, we couldn't justify the cost. Remember, its mostly Crown Land up here, so we're not tresspassing. Personally, I always thought that the tourism buisnesses should have contributed more to the trails, as they are the major benificiaries of the touring riders, but they will tell you that they can't afford it either. The other death knell for D16 was the tanking of our economy with the collapse of the forest industry. Even though I haven't used the trail system for years, and I predicted this collapse, it saddens me that it's gone. RIP D16!

Bucking Pig

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Great info pig. I always thought the government needed to give back more gas tax money for the trails. Doesn't the north still get free validation tags for Vechiles? Touring riders spend alot of money along the way on meals, gas which certain communities benefited from. Looks like it will be more regional trails in certain area's of the province once again.

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You can't expect the Nippigon area to have any other outcome with Thunder Bay being such

a-hos (< apparently the system doesn't like that phrase?) about the sport!

They blew the whole "Circle Tour", and made it a big hassle for anyone in TB to even use a sled.

Let's think about this - you live on the north shore of Lake Superior, and you hafta trailer out to at least Nippigon to get onto the trail system! :rolleyes:

I have done the "A" on a perfectly beautifull weekend up in the Geraldton / Nippigon area, and on Friday evening there was no tracks in the fresh dusting of snow since last grooming, and on Saturday we met two or four sleds is all. ...and they WERE from TB as I recall.

Seems like there has got to be some kind of bike trail or some network through TB to let the sleds git out of town eh?

.

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It isn't the cost of the permit that is the problem. It is cheap for how Many miles of trail we have. It is all of the other costs that add up. You can use 400 dollars in fuel easily riding one week in Ontario and yet you want the permit reduced. If the permit costs did go down, the permit sales wouldn't go up enough to cover the expenses either. Sledding is expensive and if it wasn't for alot of hard working volunteers we would be all riding ditches and roads. The insurance premium has to be paid for the liability of the trails, whether we get snow or not. We have 340 groomers that need to be maintained and insured, loans on them need to be paid etc. 210 bucks for a permit is cheap. We should all be glad to pay it and volunteer to help make the system more stable. There is going to be cut backs because of alot of riders are switching to two up sleds to cut costs. I ran into lots of couples last year that are now running one sled instead of two. Ok rant over, just tired of hearing the permit is too expensive.

Don't get me wrong. I completely understand what you're saying - but it can't be ignored. Like it or not, OFSC is competing with other locations for tourism dollars. You (OFSC) can't control the costs of the other things you mentioned above (gas, lodging, insurance, etc.)... the only thing they can control is the permit price. Keep in mind I'm speaking mainly of the 7-day version - the one us tourists purchase. I'm telling you in all honesty.. It does matter to those I ride with. Maybe it's a psychological thing, I dunno. But when we are deciding where to go riding, the permit cost is always the first thing they bring up. It needs to be around $75 for a 7-day.

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Don't get me wrong. I completely understand what you're saying - but it can't be ignored. Like it or not, OFSC is competing with other locations for tourism dollars. You (OFSC) can't control the costs of the other things you mentioned above (gas, lodging, insurance, etc.)... the only thing they can control is the permit price. Keep in mind I'm speaking mainly of the 7-day version - the one us tourists purchase. I'm telling you in all honesty.. It does matter to those I ride with. Maybe it's a psychological thing, I dunno. But when we are deciding where to go riding, the permit cost is always the first thing they bring up. It needs to be around $75 for a 7-day.

Personally I agree with you... the cost of a 7 day permit is just too high to be of value and then try and find a seller who has one. It has to be planned and ordered well in advance it seems in most situations.

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