1. Digitization of Reimer’s Ranch and Muleshoe Bend
Digitization and Trail Sustainability Analysis of Milton Reimer’s Ranch and Muleshoe Bend Recreation Area
Prepared By The San Marcos Trail Mappers
abstract
Results
background
The Austin Ridge Riders, a non-profit mountain bike club, has been awarded a grant to improve signage along the off-road bike trails. Our project included creating simple maps for this purpose, and to create digitized features to aid the Austin Ridge Riders with future planning and maintenance. Using the data given to us by Austin Ridge Riders and other data collected online, we digitized bike trails, roads, and other features of the parks. To determine whether the trail met the half rule of trail sustainability, we compared the slopes of the parks with that of the trails to identify areas where the trail slope was greater than half the slope of the ground it traversed. This revealed the parts of the trails that The Austin Ridge Riders will have to fix. The completion of this project will result in better overall safety of the trails for bikers of all skill levels.
Digitized maps and trail analysis where the half rule has been applied
When creating simple, user-friendly maps, a map’s role in wayfinding and trail use must be considered. In their study, Careen Yarnal and Michael Coulson concluded that trail use increased significantly with map availability, and subjects had a preference of colored maps over monochromatic maps (Yarnal & Coulson, 2013). Another study on how maps can affect wayfinding, conducted by Boon Soh and Tanya Smith- Jackson, found that signage along the trails as well as map design improved the accuracy of the users’ decision making. Subjects also preferred contour maps over shaded relief of schematic maps (Soh & Smith-Jackson, 2004).
objectives
Digitize features for Milton Reimer’s Ranch and Muleshoe Bend Recreation Area
Trail
Trail Difficulty Rating (green circle, blue square, black diamond)
5’ Elevation Contour Lines
Roads / Streets
Water Features (creeks, lakes, etc)
Proposed Trail Changes
Analyze trails for areas that do not meet the half rule
methods
Newly digitized maps provide a GIS for the Austin Ridge Riders that will aid in wayfinding and trail planning and maintenance.
Digitization of Reimer’s Ranch and Muleshoe Bend
TNRIS aerial imagery
Overlay with existing park map image
Georeference park map image to aerial imagery
Digitize features
Add trail data points and convert to line feature
Reimer’s Ranch/Muleshoe Bend GIS
conclusions
New maps will help the Austin Ridge Riders plan and maintain trails at Reimer’s Ranch and Muleshoe Bend
Improve overall safety for mountain bikers of all skill levels
While several elements apply to trail sustainability, a large portion of the trails in Reimer’s Ranch and Muleshoe Bend do not meet the half rule.
Many possibilities for GPS use in future projects:
Potential hazards
Endangered plant species
Trail Sustainability Analysis
Add DEM and clip to park outline
Find slope of park
Extract trail elevation from DEM using trail line feature as the mask
Find slope of trail system
Use raster calculator to apply half rule comparing park slopes to trail slopes
“TrailSlopes” > 0.5*”ParkSlopes”
Output contains “0” (meets half rule) and “1” (does not meet half rule) values
Trail sustainability analysis revealed that 33% of trails in Muleshoe Bend do not meet the half rule, while 40% of Reimer’s Ranch trails do not meet the half rule for sustainable trails.