If you are reading this then I thank you for taking a break from your crack pipe or putting down your spray can.

WTF?!

Well as this is a mountain bike forum one assumes you're a mountain biker, and if one is to believe the labels put on us recently we are all involved in "... Vandalism, Graffiti and possibly widespread use of Drugs and alcohol...". That quote comes straight from a flyer that has been circulating in Hornsby to try and sway locals against a plan for mountain bike skills areas and trails.

It's a sad state of affairs that with no actual evidence, logic or reason to argue against a small, yet much valued mountain bike plan Ku-ring-gai council has approved, those who oppose the plan have resorted to throwing around wild accusations.

Yet the worst of it is that Ku-ring-gai council staff have actually listened to submissions based on this nonsense and changed their plans, scrapping part of the project, holding a second phase indefinitely and wasting funding on studies called for by various scaremongers. To be frank, it's disgusting.

To be clear, such a turn of events will affect much more than this one plan: If mountain bike riders are to ever receive fair treatment and planning for the facilities they require this council and other authorities need to be shown that the accusations levelled in the flyer are pure nonsense and riders will not stand to be labelled in this way.

If you too take offence at being labelled a vandal and drug addict just because you choose to ride a mountain bike please take a minute or so and write to the Ku-ring-gai council and let them know this. Let them know you are disgusted that they would lend any credence to such claims and modify already approved plans as a result. It might also help to mention if you support both stage one and two of the Golden Jubilee mountain bike plan and call for both stages to go ahead unchanged.

Please write to these councillors and the local politician, and explain all this as tactfully as you can:

[email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected], [email protected]

Thank you.