NH bike trail debate

There's some great trail names in this slide.  "Zone of Fear" "Area of Influence" "Silent Scare" "Invisible Footprint"

High Metabolic Stress would be a great name for a climbing trail.

Sierra club meets ai slop

It's perfectly OK having shitload of snowmobile trails in that area (and I've seen dirt bikes on them in summer, too), but MTBs are the danger zone. 

Funny this was top of my feed on Fbook today as well, and I live in a different country.  

and an interstate at the foot of the mountain.

A quick google search brought up this article:

https://www.concordmonitor.com/2026/03/08/mount-kearsarge-bike-trail-concerns-warner/

Some fun notes from the article (and looking at a map):

The trail is meant to run alongside the road. The road which is used to access the hiking trail, with a parking lot at 2600'. I believe this directly refutes all claims made on the 2 slides in the original post. Sierra Club gonna Sierra Club, though.

And then this quote: “It’s an area to be left alone and not promoted and exploited for more of this ruinous activity like single-track mountain biking"

On Google maps, it sure looks like you can drive within 1000 feet of the summit, which tells me that the 400-meter zone of fear the OP mentions already exists. So with the addition of an MTB trail parallel to the road, we're talking about turning a 400-meter zone of fear into a 500 or maybe 600-meter zone of fear. Which still sounds like a lot, but it's a lot less than going from zero to four hundred.

I'm an ecologist by training and trade, and people like this make me 🙄

Favorite part of the linked article is the guy who hunts "all over" up there but believes "It’s an area to be left alone and not promoted and exploited." I'm not reflexively anti-hunting but I think we can all agree shooting wildlife is certainly not the same as leaving them alone. Similarly our trail group is now dealing with one moderately consternated individual who has engaged in some light vandalism of trail features. His profession? Logger.

My position on this will depend heavily on if the proposed trail is blue flow or NoCo south.