Mountain Bikers Protest Trail Restrictions at Pleasanton Ridge Park

PLEASANTON (KPIX) -- Mountain bikers are upset at what they consider a lack of access to East Bay Regional Park trails. On Sunday, they held a demonstration ride to make a point about what they say is the fastest-growing outdoor sport in the nation.

On a warm Sunday morning, Pleasanton Ridge Regional Park was a popular place as hikers headed up the fire roads to take in the views and, this day, they had a lot of company on the trail.

A large group of dedicated mountain bikers staged a protest ride -- a kind of "Critical Mass" -- on the very same fire roads which are the only trails they're legally allowed to use.

"They're concentrating all of us on that fire road -- mountain bikers, horseback and hikers. So, you have user group conflicts," said protest organizer Chris Beratlis. "Wouldn't everybody get along if we had less bikers coming down these fire roads?"

The number of bike riders has exploded in recent months. Joel Shrock says membership in his mountain bike club swelled during the pandemic.

"Our Bay Area mountain bike group went from 1,000 to 8,000 people in about a year and a half," he said.

The dispute is over the district's ban on "single track" riding -- using narrow paths and cattle trails as an off-road route through the park. Police recently began writing tickets to anyone they caught doing that. The district says complaints are rising about excessive speed and safety concerns.

In a statement issued Sunday, assistant general manager Carol Johnson said, "We challenge mountain bikers to work with us and not create or ride on unauthorized, unsafe trails as was the case in Pleasanton Ridge that caused the need for enforcement last week with cyclists who were cited."

The bikers say that, if the district designated some of the already-existing single-track trails for bikes only, there wouldn't be any safety concerns. It would take most of them off the crowded fire roads as they make their faster descent down the mountain. As it is now, they are the only ones not allowed to use the narrow paths.

"We're not asking for months or years of studies to do this," said Beratlis. "We want action now. We want them to do this now because, if they don't, this is going to grow. We're going to grow this and hit all their parks throughout the next few weeks. And lawyers -- we're talking, getting people involved."

The East Bay Regional Parks system is the largest in the nation with more than 1,250 miles of trails. They say that, since the pandemic, visitation is at 25 million people per year -- up more than 30 percent. Everyone acknowledges the trails are getting more crowded but the cyclists say they want the district to recognize that they are also part of the public that the parks are supposed to serve.

"They give the hikers what they want," Beratlis said. "They give the horseback riders what they want. It's time to make the mountain bikers happy and appease a very large user group."