What up man!  Do yo live in Mooresville?  Forgive if we know each other already, I can't keep up with everyone's forum name.  

Lots of good stuff going on at Mazeppa.  I'll take this as an opportunity to share some of the short/long term projects that are happening at the park.  Jamie Haessly is the TC, and I (Will Washam) have been working with Jamie, Jim Horton (the trail builder who built the Mazeppa) and the Town's Park's and Rec director so we're all on a good page about trail maintenance, and trail improvements going forward.

The Town of Mooresville built the main line Mazeppa trail to be a beginner mtb trail.  There are regularly folks with kids on striders out there and it's pretty rad.  It's also rad that the town has taken ownership of providing mtb trails with their own dime/staff resources.  That is super rare in our area and I believe Mooresville is the only land manager that has independently developed mtb trails within the THTB's system of trails we maintain.  THTB didn't even have to convince the town that trails were something the town needed, local tourism staff (happened to be an mtb rider) and the town parks and rec director (happens to have SORBA training) got together to make this trail happen.  I'm super proud to be a Mooresville resident with my town taking on projects like this.

As a teaser, the town is interested in making more investments in mtb amenities at Mazeppa.  Mainly because of the success they have seen with this beginner level trail and how many families are enjoying it.  Hopefully more to come there...

The THTB have been assessing how the trail has worn in over it's first year and we've been working with Jim Horton on hardening up areas of the trail that are suffering from ground water seeps.  If you ride here much you've noticed there are quite a few areas that have ground water seeps that are keeping trail sections wet much longer than other trails in the area.

To combat this, our strategy is to work on hardening seep areas with rock armoring, paver blocks, and gravel so that the trail can be opened up sooner after wet weather times.  We're starting on the side of the loop closest to the soccer fields (everything on the soccer side of the GoPro service rd that cuts the trail in half) and eventually working our way to the back of the loop near the farm field that has the worst seeps.  Our big group workday a few weeks ago (thanks all that came) got about 80% of the seep spots on the trail closer to the soccer fields.  We also put in a new short loop connector that will allow the trails closer to the soccer field to open up sooner after rain events so we can ride while the stuff in the back that is getting hammered by these seeps dries out.  Over the next year we hope to armor up all the seep spots on the entire main loop so this trail is ready to rip most of the time.  

That's the main gist of whats going.  A big thanks to the Town of Mooresville for being proactive about providing biking recreation opportunities.  If you're a resident of Mooresville let you mayor, and council people know we appreciate it!

-Wil