An order by the Department of the Interior to ease restrictions on electric bikes is prompting the city of Durango to re-examine its cycling rules.
The order redefines e-bikes as “bicycles” and directs the Bureau of Land Management, National Park Service, National Wildlife Refuge and Bureau of Reclamation to allow e-bikes where other types of bicycles are allowed.
The city of Durango does not allow e-bikes on natural-surface trails. But some of those trails cross from city land to BLM land, which is why the city is reconsidering its ban on e-bikes on natural-surface trails, Parks and Recreation Director Cathy Metz said.
“We would like to be consistent with the federal government – not that we have to be,” Metz said.
Before the city makes a formal decision, the staff needs to answer legal questions about allowing e-bikes on public land. To inform a decision, the city may hold a public forum to hear from residents and possibly conduct a trial period by allowing e-bikes on soft-surface trails, she said.
The city explored allowing e-bikes on its trails in 2016 and 2017. It decided to allow e-bikes on hard-surface paths, like the Animas River Trail, after a one-year trial period that demonstrated e-bikes did not cause problems.
The city prohibited e-bikes on dirt trails that traverse open spaces, however, because conservation easements the city signed when it purchased much of its open space do not allow motorized use. The conservation easements are legally binding documents held by La Plata Open Space Conservancy.
The city staff plans to ask the conservancy for a fresh opinion about allowing e-bikes, Metz said.
If the city decides to test e-bikes on soft-surface trails, it could allow them for one year, likely in the Twin Buttes open space, because it is not governed by a conservation easement, she said.
Conflicts have been known to happen between cyclists and pedestrians on the city’s soft-surface trails because of short sight lines, so Metz said she wants to ensure the addition of e-bikes would not exacerbate the problem.
Allowing e-bikes could also lead to more cyclists traveling at higher speeds on city trails, which could necessitate patrols and possibly ticketing bad actors, she said.
“It may force the city to become more regulatory,” Metz said.
Mary Monroe Brown, executive director of Trails 2000, said e-bikes may be appropriate on some trails in Durango where they will not cause undue soil erosion or social conflict. Trails 2000 builds and maintains trails in La Plata County.
“We think we need to look at it and make that decision as a community,” she said. “But I think we can make that decision with facts.”
