News/Events

Due heavy rain overnight and Thursday morning and Freedom Park trails being closed, the Thurs, 2/6/25 night ride at Freedom Park is cancelled. Williamsburg got a lot more rain than the TV weather guys said.  Around 1:00 PM Freedom Park staff reported 1.75" in their rain gauge, and standing water in many areas of the park.  Thanks for staying off of wet trails.

Want to get push notifications for when trails close and reopen due to rain?  Check out the other post on EVMA.org from 02/06/25 for details on how to get James City County's Rainout Line app.  If you have this, you would have gotten a push notification of trail closures at 9:04 AM on 2/6/25.

Want to get push notifications when trails are closed due to weather/wet conditions?  James City County just added Freedom Park to their Rainout Line.  Sign up at the Rainout Line Website https://rainoutline.com/subscribe/notify/7572392002/0 and use the tabs to choose app, text, or e-mail alerts.  You can sign up to get alerts only for Freedom Park Trails A-E, or any JCC facilities that face weather closures.  (*This is ONLY for Freedom Park bike trail closures, but if Freedom trails are closed, we should probably avoid nearby trails like New Quarter, YRSP, Wahrani, Harwoods Mill.)  You can also still call 757-259-4022 x1, or visit here: https://jamescitycountyva.gov/Facilities/Facility/Details/Freedom-Park-7.

This week's retirees group ride will be at 2 PM on Wednesday, 5 Feb, at New Quarter Park.

Trail Reversals! We asked Freedom Park to reverse the riding direction of trails D & E for February.  Look out for the cool reversible-direction signs at the trail heads/ends to be changed from Saturday, Feb 1 through Fri, Feb 28.  We haven’t reversed these trails in a while and we’d like to make it somewhat regular.  In many informal discussions with various EVMA members over the last few years, we’ve heard mixed reactions about reversals.  We can’t please everybody.  Here is some common feedback:

• Many (but not all) people say that they enjoy D reversed occasionally.  A good number really want D reversed more often. 
  
• The consensus is that many people seem to not enjoy E reversed.  But some do like it reversed sometimes just to get something different, even if they agree that it flows better forward.
• D & E work well as one big loop, with trail heads/ends that line up.  It works well to have both reversed at the same time to keep the loop (even if E backwards is not most people’s favorite).
• D & E have few access points, so there’s little risk of people entering the trails there and going the wrong way during reversals.  So if we’re going to reverse some trails, D & E make sense.  We’ll never reverse C during normal park hours, as you can’t ride the features reversed. (But we sometimes night-ride C backwards which many agree is fun!)  Trails A & C have too many access points for people to enter the trail, so there’s no good way to notify/enforce reversed directions. 
• If you haven’t tried D & E reversed yet, give them a try.  Even if you don’t like them as much reversed, at least it will be like riding a new and different trail.

Please join us for a club meeting at noon, including lunch.  We currently don’t have a ride or trail work scheduled due to the threat of rain, but if the forecast changes for the better, look for a possible ride.We’ll discuss upcoming trail work projects, volunteer opportunities, Board elections, etc.  Several people who will or might run for Board election or otherwise plan to volunteer will be there.  We’ll discuss job duties and answer questions.***If you are interested in running for a Board position, or otherwise volunteering to help in any capacity (Trail Captain; social media; membership management; graphic design; anything at all) this is your chance to come talk to us and/or ask questions.  Several people have talked to us about filling positions, and we could always use more help. 

The Tuesday night (28 Jan) ride at Harwood's and Wednesday (29 Jan) retirees ride are canceled this week. We're giving the trails time to dry out, especially Harwood's. If you ride there solo, then be careful of the entrance to the "B" trail; it's become a mudpit. We'll be fixing that later this week.

Join us for an 11:30 AM group ride on Sat, Jan 25 @ York River State Park. We'll ride some combination of Bobcat, Marl Ravine, and the new (still unnamed) trail.  Meet a little before 11:30 in the parking lot just past the pay station so we can roll by 11:30.  ***This late start should give it time to warm up and time for Southsiders and those coming from further away enough time to arrive without getting up to early. 

SATURDAY 18 JAN, 8 AM - 12 PM - Harwood's trails are closed for the annual foot race supported by Newport News Parks.

Friday 4:00 PM is ON, Saturday is cancelled.  Explanation below.

• Friday: meet at 4:00 PM along the park road at access C1 (near park entrance) to help unload 2 tons of turfstones.  We have 5 people confirmed and could use only a few more.  Bring work gloves.
• Saturday - CANCELLED: The plan was to meet at 10:00 AM and haul a 4-ton trailer load of purchased dirt to use along with the turfstones to rebuild a berm on trail C.  But our dirt supplier (JSG, next to Freedom Park) is not loading dirt now because their dirt source is still covered in snow.  So we considered some smaller projects using pushpiles of dirt at Freedom Park, but one of our project leaders was on site and said that the ground is frozen and digging will be no good.
• So we’ll look for the earliest chance to reschedule, which will probably be at least a few weeks out.  Sorry!

Tonights ride at Freedom is a go.  6 PM.