Residents petition against mountain biking in DeForest's Rivers Turn Park

In the realm of public discourse and basic rights of citizens, at times a fine line to walk exists between exercising ones freedoms and overstepping their boundaries.

At first glance, oftentimes the line between what would be considered normal and abnormal exercising of rights appears to be a clear one, but in reality, this is not always the case. In DeForest, over the concern of habitat conservation, discussions are continuing about who can ride their bikes where at River’s Turn Park.

For three years now, several locals including Anne Marie Preece have been gathering signatures on a petition to have off trail biking prohibited in River’s Turn Park along the Upper Yahara River Trail.

Their reasoning primarily is to protect the habitat of certain bird species, particularly red headed and red bellied woodpeckers, and simply to adhere to the rules posted for many other Dane County parks, particularly the prohibition of off-trail activities.

On April 4, the village board met to discuss the possible action regarding a temporary prohibition of mountain biking in the park. Judd Blau, the director of public services for the village, weighed in with how the meeting went.

“We understand the concerns over wildlife and habitat conservancy,” said Blau. “In response to the petition, we did vote to temporarily prohibit off-trail biking. We also decided to allot a mowed and maintained grassy area near River’s Turn Park to be used by the DeForest Mountain Biking Team and for classes in mountain biking to be held.”

According to a release by the village board, representatives of the village have already begun removing current off-trail biking paths to restore the area to its natural landscape. Furthermore, the aforementioned grassy area was used in the fall of last year by the DeForest Mountain Bike Team for roughly eight practices.

These practices went over without a hitch, and as a result, hosting classes was decided upon. Lastly, the Public Service Committee said that they will work with the Comprehensive Outdoor Recreation Plan (CORP) to continue looking for alternative mountain bike locations within the village, and that the community will have several opportunities to provide input on the plan prior to adoption. The opportunities to do so are as follows:

Community Survey: April 1-22Public Input Meeting: April 17, Village HallPublic review and input meeting with first draft: date TBDPublic Service Committee review: TBDPublic Service Committee review second draft: TBDPlanning and Zoning review: TBDVillage Board review and approval: TBD

To address further considerations the village board must look into, such as reports to determine whether the park should be restricted from mountain biking, how to form an ordinance against off trail biking should the decision go that way, and what such an ordinance might look like, next steps have been put into place and are as follows:

CORP Community Survey: April 1-22Public Services meeting: April 15CORP Public Input meeting: April 17

For more information or if you have questions or concerns, check out The Village of DeForest online.