Posts Tagged ‘Lang Ranch Community Park’

Thousand Oaks Planning Commission Hearing for Sapwi Trails

Thursday, September 29th, 2016

In 2012, CORBA put out the call for the public to come to Thousand Oaks to show support for a new Bike Park facility at what was then called Lang Ranch.  You responded in droves, and the Conejo Rec and Parks District heard. Now renamed the Sapwi Trails Community Park, the re-envisioned park includes many items the mountain biking community asked for.

In our last bike park update we had little news other than the environmental process was moving forward.  The project’s environmental review is now complete.

The most recent iteration of the park’s master plan includes a beginner pump track at one end of park as a component of a smaller, local neighborhood park. The neighborhood park at the corner of Erbes Road and Scenicpark Street also includes restrooms, a boulder garden, picnic areas, a practice disc golf basket, parking areas, and trail connections to the rest of the larger Community Park.

The larger Community Park includes disc golf, a multi-use trails network, bicycle skills features along some of those trails, interpretive exhibits, additional parking, and a non-motorized model glider port among other things. It also features a dedicated area for a bike skills park. The plan shows two pump tracks and skills features, but is there only as a placeholder. The Bike Park will undergo a separate design process, based on input from the bicycling community.  The master plan is available at the CRPD web site, and archived here.

Sapwi Trails Conceptual Bike Park Plan THousand Oaks

Note this is a “conceptual” placeholder design for the bike park area.

The plans will be presented to the City of Thousand Oaks Planning Commission for approval on October 10 at 6 pm.  We urge anyone, especially those local to the Conejo Valley, to attend the Commission hearing, fill out a speaker card, and express your support for the plan, including the trails and bike skills park components (and any other components you’d like to support).

 

Lang Ranch Community Park Meeting #3 Sees Another Good Turnout

Thursday, March 1st, 2012
Jim Friedl talks about the process

Jim Friedl talks about the process

It was another good turnout at Wednesday’s community input meeting for the Lang Ranch Community Park Conceptual Recreational Use Plan process. This, the third of four meetings, was aimed at further prioritizing the list of potential uses supplied by community members.

Another great turnout

Another great turnout

Approximately 75 attendees were given maps of the planned park site and were encouraged to indicate locations where they thought they might want to put certain amenities. On the back of the maps were lists of potential uses, divided up into three categories; Green: Those the agency (Conejo Recreation and Park District, CRPD) felt were appropriate uses based on the plan’s criteria; Red: Those that did not meet the criteria; and Yellow: Those that were “on the bubble” and could go into either the Green or Red categories. Attendees were divided into five groups with two facilitators each and provided input on any amenities that were missing, as well as any amenities that should move from one category to another. Afterward, groups summarized their input.

Based on group summaries, bicycle related amenities, including a pump track and skills features, were still a high priority. A new term came up in the list of prospective bike amenities, “dual slalom course,” which while new to the process, is not a new concept. It’s basically the same thing as slalom ski racing; two parallel downhill courses run through gates with jumps and berm turns. Sort of like downhill BMX (but it can be done on mountain bikes as well).

Members of the public talk about their proposed changes

Members of the public talk about their proposed changes

CRPD facilitators reminded attendees that this is still very early in the process and that they are in “big picture” mode. To quote Jim Friedl, CRPD General Manager, “We’re not yet looking at the gnat’s eyebrow at this point.” The next and final community meeting takes place March 21, and from there CRPD staff will produce a report and recommendation to present to the CRPD board. According to Friedl, an optimistic estimate for delivering that presentation could be 4-6 months.