Marblehead Bike Park Supporters Seek Green Light At Town Meeting

MARBLEHEAD, MA —Supporters of a Marblehead bike park are hoping town meeting members back a proposed conversion of a largely unused lot on the corner of Green and Beacon streets into a new destination for mountain bikers in town.

Article 33 of the warrant for the May 2 town meeting looks for backing to turn a portion of the lot — which supporters of the bike park said has not be used for a specific purpose for 50 years — in the bike park that they said will come at no additional cost to the town.

Volunteers, who have been working on the project for more than years, have already secured support from the School Committee to transfer control of the park to the town or the Marblehead Recreation Department. Representatives told the Finance Commission at the annual warrant meeting earlier this month that they will then assume all construction and maintenance costs for the park through fundraising.

"We believe that the way to develop the next generation of conservationists is to give our community members space to be outside, be creative, and collaborate with the groups in town that steward our outdoor spaces," bike park supporter and volunteer Eleanor Sachs told Patch.

The park is proposed to use about 20 percent of the current lot and will be outside of the wetlands buffer zone. Sachs said it will be constructed with all-natural materials and "using best practices for trail building."

Supporters said that while they view the park as a long-term beneficial use of the land, the permission to construct the park will be considered "temporary" in the event that the town deems the space needed for another more critical use in the future.

"Mountain biking has been a growing sport for decades," Sachs said. "Partly as a response to the pandemic, bike sales in the U.S. increased by 62 percent in 2020 over the previous year and mountain bike trails across the U.S. are showing increases of up to 500 percent.

"This is not just a knee jerk reaction to the pandemic but a shift in health, wellness and outdoor appreciation prioritization."

The full warrant for the May 2 annual town meeting can be found here.

(Scott Souza is a Patch field editor covering Beverly, Danvers, Marblehead, Peabody, Salem and Swampscott. He can be reached at Scott.Souza@Patch.com. Twitter: @Scott_Souza.)