ATV Trail

[bmac]

Hopefully, we will be breaking ground soon for our new home on 12 heavily wooded acres. My son has been asking for a go-cart / ATV for at least the past 5 years and we did not have the room for him to ride nor the space to store one. We promised him that some day, we would be building on some acreage and we would get something then. Well, that time is nearing and I need some advice.

Our plan is to have a riding trail (which we may also want for walking) encircling about 6 acres with an access trail to the rear of the house. I thought it would be prudent to have this done by the crew that is cutting the driveway and clearing the building site. I'm assuming I'll have the big trees removed by the same folks who are hauling off the timber from the building site and the stumps can be burned with the other stuff from the homesite.


Once they do the rough clearing of the trail, what is the likely procedure from there? I'm concerned about erosion initially. And, while a rough trail might be fun on an ATV, it wouldn't necessarily be good for a walking trail. I'm thinking I could smooth things out with my little boxblade but it seems like something should be done to stabilize the surface. Then I'm thinking that, no matter what I do to the surface, any significant ATV traffic will undo anything I might attempt.

On the attached drawing (crude, I admit) I've sketched out kind of what I'm talking about. The purple is the driveway, the green is the clearing for the house, the blue is a small creek at the rear of the propery. The red is kind of how I envision the trail.

The property slopes from front to back and there are a few ravines on the property some of which are probably 10-12 feet deep. Of course, this brings up another issue - bridges to cross the ravines or grade the slopes a little. Obviously bridges are better for walking while driving down and into and up out of the ravines would be more fun for the ATV

So, for those of you who have done something like this, I would appreciate any advice you may have to offer.

Thanks

 

[Bird]

I don't know anything about go cart tracks, but when my brother bought 10 acres; solid timber, brush, vines, etc.; so much so that we had a hard time walking through it to find the boundary stakes, and only one side fenced, we cleared a track, not exactly straight along the edge of the boundary, but close to it, avoiding any big trees, and we simply did it ourselves with an axe and chain saw. He cut everything so close that he got the chain into the dirt quite a bit. In fact, he ruined a sprocket on his new Stihl chainsaw before we were through. The dealer said he couldn't warranty it and my brother told him he didn't expect warranty; that the cost of the repairs was the cheapest way to do what he wanted to do. And we, too, had some pretty deep and steep ravines to cross. We built no bridges, but did rework some of the slopes slightly so we could drive both my B7100 Kubota and his Kawasaki Mule along that loop around his property. So, I think it would have made a fine go cart track, too, although we didn't make it wide enough for racing; i.e., wide enough for one to pass another.

 

[db2]

<font color="blue"> "any significant ATV traffic will undo anything I might attempt."</font>

You're right about that. I have made many trails on my property in the bush and through and across wet areas. We use the trails for walking, biking, skiing and travel them with tractor, ATV and Jeep. To build the trails I just cut the trees, bladed then brush hogged the trails each year. I put in a couple of culverts where I filled wet areas. Within a couple of years the woody growth stops and grasses (weeds) take over. Makes for nice access to the property. Of course ATV use is going to leave it's impact especially if the rider likes to tear things up.

 

[rdln]

Sight unseen, i would go with Bird's suggestion. You should be able to weave safe trail with out knock down anything too big to handle yourself.

They're smallest bulldozer might have an 8 foot blade which might be too big.

And it would be good father-son bonding experience, ya know out their with tractors and chainsaws being manly-men (Insert Tim Allen Grunt here)

Also they might bring a chipper on sight for the building sight clearing, the wood chips make a good nature trail topping.

 

[bmac]

Bird, Dave and Steve,

Thanks for the replies. I think the chainsaw method would certainly allow more precision to the trail design and protect against erosion. I hate to admit it here, but the truth is I haven't used a chainsaw in probably 30 years or more and only had limited experience with one then. And, at this point in my life, I'm not sure I want to assume the liability of re-learning the proper use of what I consider to be a very dangerous piece of equipment (particularly when used by someone like me). So, I guess I either go the quick and dirty bulldozer method or hire someone with a chainsaw to cut the stuff my bush hog won't cut. I think my son and I could do the manly bonding stuff clearing out the cut trees and grooming the trail with the tractor.

As far as the width of the trail goes, I was actually thinking a 10-12 ft wide path (? road) anyway to allow safe passing of the ATVs and to give the kids a little room for error in their driving. Therefore, I don't think the dozer would be a problem in that respect. But, as I stated before, I'm just concerned about the surface condition after the dozer has plowed down all of the vegetation and the tracks have chewed up the surface.

Well, now I guess I'll have to come to terms with the fact that I've admitted to all of my TBN friends that I'm afraid of chainsaws. /forums/images/graemlins/grin.gif If I'm not careful, I might spill the beans and admit that I don't like the smell of diesel fuel. Doh!!! I hate it when that happens.

 

[db2]

<font color="blue"> </font><font color="blue" class="small">( I was actually thinking a 10-12 ft wide path )</font> </font>

Most of my trails are that wide and some were made with a dozer. After the dozer was done you could drag something (a tree, old bed springs, harrow or whatever you have available) behind your tractor to smooth out the dozer track marks. I used a spuce tree and it worked well. My dozer operator was a real artist and he was able to smooth and contour the trail and banks the way I wanted him to. I was surprised how fast the greenery came back.

Regards

 

[rdln]

10-12 ft wont hurt considering that vegetation will grow outwards after all that extra sunlight comes down and might close the trail in some without maintenance.

Dont be ashamed about the power tool thing, in your profession you need all your digits. I have a friend that is an orthopedic surgeon, I am surprised he does the yard work and other projects he does.

 

[DUMBDOG]

I am afraid of chainsaws also. In addition I am afraid of any and all of the other power tools that I use. The day that I am not afraid of them is the day that I will quit using them.

 

[Bird]

</font><font color="blue" class="small">( I'm afraid of chainsaws )</font>

Me, too. I'll use'em, but I'm scared of'em, and I figure anyone who gets over his fear of them is likely to get hurt bad by one. Some might say it's respect for them instead of fear of them, and I won't disagree, but I figure sometimes there's a very fine line between respect and fear. /forums/images/graemlins/wink.gif /forums/images/graemlins/laugh.gif

 

[bczoom]

bmac

A couple thoughts and questions.
You mentioned having timber taken out for the building site. Are you going to have the whole thing logged? If so, the timber company will likely bring in a dozer to make some trails. What they may want to get logs out may be a different plan than what you have pictured. You'll want to walk the property with them to determine and agree upon where the trails will go.

I would avoid putting a trail over stumps cut at ground level. After a period of time, the dirt will erode and the stump will become a huge bump in the trail. These won't be safe for riding and will be a problem when you're grading with a blade.

The trails that you pictured are pretty straight. For an ATV trail, I would propose something with more turns. Riding straight trails can get boring relatively quickly. Kids will compensate by increased speed which is obviously more dangerous. I would also consider some cross trails (top to bottom of the picture provided) to provide more areas. Maybe connect the trail to the driveway at the bottom of the picture as well. The driveway can then be part of the trail system.

How wide are the ravines? Personally, I drive the ATV's through the ravine. For walking, I made a 2' wide bridge for the span. A bridge big enough for an ATV can get pretty pricy.


For grading, the box blade will work fine. The big thing is to grade so no puddles remain as they will create pot holes.

What kind of ground do you have (clay, stone...)? My trails that are primarily clay don't erode to badly from traffic.

Brian