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Know your trails.......
Reading some of the latest comments, it seems that there's quite a few riders that either don't know the names of the new trails or still refer to them by their own personal names. Our regular sunday mtb group has made-up names for all the trails that we've ridden over the years, but thanks to Travis Deane (his great mtb guidebook) and the recent naming the trails competition, we now know the official names of all our fav trails old and new. It's important that everyone embraces these new names, calls them by name on the trail and when chatting on the pmbc website,'coz I think when you know your trail names, you're more likely to take a sense of ownership and responsibility for them and look after them better.
On the ''looking after your trails'' theme, as Murray, Paddy and Cam (these guys are the legendary and voluntary lead trail builders of the new K.C. circuit and others)have said, 'if every mtb'er (who rides these trails) gave up just ONE sunday a year to help build/maintain the trails, then we would have more than enough LEGAL trails to keep everyone happy'.
So, know your trails, call them by their correct names and get off your butts and commit to helping just once a year to build, maintain and take ownership of OUR fantastic trail network.
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The name that everyone calls a trail is the name that appears on the map. The only map that shows all the trails is the Open Street map (OSM) map. This map can be edited by anyone, is free, can be installed onto Garmin GPSs for free, and is routable. There is no copyright to it. It can be downloaded into Android phones.
Use this map to name your trails.
Example.
http://osm.org/go/swlrvry1
We will have signs for the new KC trails soon.
Guys... there is an awesome trails DB section of this site. Just get involved and make sure the trails you ride are all there, and are all named correctly. If you are confused by how this all works, check out the Global Riders (PerthMTB website runs this system) page on The Trails/Ride Area Database.
In particular, the Creating Tracks page.
If you want to talk about ownership, etc. Where you do you think people should come look for trail information in WA? OSM or PerthMTB?
Can you download the PerthMTB onto your GPS?
Why not put the trails onto both resources with the same name. OSM is editable.
OSM is like wrestling a greasy pig (but less fun).
It takes a serious time investment to learn the OSM way of doing things, I know you're a fanboy Zoom but my experiences have been less than pleasant (to put it politely).
Just all agree to buy Garmins, the last Magellan I had (eXplorist 600) was junk the Magellan software was worse. The more quality info out there the better, but don't throw junk up, the web is full of it already.
The more people contribute to all resources the more valuable they become. Do what you can, if you can upload easily to both, great. Clear concise filenames and keywords are best. I was looking for some GPS files on the Munda Biddi and I think the best one I found was called "Robs ride Sunday" doesn't really tell me much.
I think its a good idea zoom.
Looks like you have done a lot of work on it.
Well, you can certainly download the whole thing as KML.
If you can't get that onto your GPS then tell me what format you can get on there and will try and get something done.
Me too Zoom. Suprised Agusta supports it though as opening it up to the public is a great way to have all the secret trails posted. Good to see he's supporting a MTB brother though.
Oh... I should also mention that the trails DB here has elevation graphs of the trails. OK, not that big a deal but can you ask OSM to draw these?
This site also derives elevation from a public (Google) API when it isn't there - great for just drawing trails on Google Earth if you didn't get round to GPS'ing 'em yet.
Scratchy, aren't you a moderator on rotorburn?
Your not exactly contributing to the thread in a positive manner.
Shouldn't you know better?
Nice try Agusta but I'm not biting.
You can download a simple file that allows you to view OSM and other maps in 3D overlaid on Google Earth.
Go here
http://ge-map-overlays.appspot.com/
The OSM map is the ONLY map you can load onto your GPS that has mountain bike trails.
Additionally, you often need more information then just the trail you're riding on. If you have an accident or mechanical you need to know the quickest route to main roads or towns.
I won't go on much more about OSM but once you start looking at maps for mountain biking you start to realise that OSM is the only practical choice.
I'm not saying OSM is a bad idea but would imagine pretty much no-one here (aside from zoom of course) would have a clue how to load an OSM map onto their GPS. No offence anyone - it's just a rare thing to want to do, even for those that do have a 'proper' GPS.
The point I was trying to make is that when people want to research MTB around Perth where are they going to come? Active members of the PerthMTB site would surely want to make their site the best source of information on that. Perhaps they could load up trails into OSM and then embed OSM into this site, but where is the control in that? Eg. what sort of hoops would one have to go through to remove a dodgy trail that was added to OSM by someone else (compared to a mod. on this site just de-publishing a track)?
Anyhow, back to the GPS thing. Zoom - if you can tell me what sort of file is required (a GPX or something I'm guessing?) to load up onto your GPS would happily look at making some sort of export.
All the good tracks are already on there. It's just a matter of people downloading it onto their computer and then transferring it onto their GPS.
Good luck with that!
Last time I looked there was no download button. You have to learn how to do things the OSM way. Think of it like learning a new software program like Photoshop. You know what you want to do but how to do it doesn't seem obvious (or easy). I would love them to work on the user interface because the concept is a good idea.
Rob. .gpx and .kml should be fine for 99.9% of punters.
I've added a GPX export link to each of the trail DB entry pages now. You should see it in the 'At a glance' box under the KML export link.
Does someone want to have a bash at putting this one of these on their GPS and let me know how it goes?