Riverside, CA is a large urban area with a population around 325,000 people located about an hour east of Los Angeles. Riverside is surprisingly blessed to offer an abundant amount of parks which provide opportunities for recreation throughout the city. Among these parks is a large nature reserve called Sycamore Canyon. This past week, the city along with Jenson USA was able to host the IMBA Trail Care Crew. The goal of the IMBA TCC is to teach local communities about building, and maintaining trail systems while working with local land managers in the best interest of sustainability.
Last spring Jenson USA moved its prime location to the City of Riverside, just a few hundred feet from Sycamore Canyon Park. Luis Razo, retail manager of the Jenson USA Corona, CA store, was responsible for opening dialog with IMBA. There are two TCC teams that travel the U.S. growing awareness for sustainable trails. The TCC that visited Riverside consisted of husband and wife super-team Chris and Leslie Kehmeier. They are an overflowing wealth of knowledge about not only trail building, but also about growing awareness with the local community. The Trail Care Crew class took place over a four-day event. Community members, city employees, club members, Jenson USA employees, and Boy Scouts all came to learn the craft of trail care.
IMBA’s focus was on improving the local trails in Sycamore Canyon to best suit the community’s users. Time was spent hiking, riding, scouting, and digging on trails which are already in heavy use. Excitement was brewing from motivated cyclists and Jenson USA workers as plans for continued improvement and maintenance were discussed. The first step going forward is to work with the City of Riverside on organizing future trail maintenance. Thank you to IMBA, Chris and Leslie, the City of Riverside and all those involved for helping work towards the vision of providing a bicycle friendly city.
If you’d like more information on this event or Jenson USA please contact Andrew McMullan at amcmullan@jensonusa.com 