John Worth Built Kingdom Trails, an 100-mile Trail Like No Other
How do you create a trail system from scratch? Ask John Worth, the founder of Vermont's insanely popular Kingdom Trails, which transformed the formerly near-defunct ski town of East Burke into a mountain bike mecca with over 100 miles of signed trails, a visitor center, and maps.
Find a town in need of a fresh revenue stream. Worth and his business partner Vince Jacob opened East Burke Sports as a ski shop in 1988. “We wanted to stay open in the summer, so we began selling bikes.”
Start cutting sick trails. With nowhere to ride and bikes to sell, they took things into their own hands. “I didn’t even know it was called singletrack,” says Worth.
Find friends in high places. “I was being sneaky, cutting trails on a lot of people’s land we didn’t know." When local politican Doug Kitchel heard about this, he went door-to-door to make it official, convincing over 50 landowners to give permission for trails to be built on their private property.
Don't give up. Worth relied on volunteers to work on trails, and tried to raise money selling maps, but it wasn't enough.
Ask people to chip in. To finance trail building and maintenance, Worth started selling trail passes. “There was resistance, but before long people were happy to pay to support this.”
Grow! “We’ve been growing by at least 10 percent every year, and we are now seeing 80,000 visitors in a year.”
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