Bainbridge Island sits directly west of downtown Seattle, roughly ten miles across the Puget Sound. In addition to the many visitors who catch the ferry from Seattle to visit the island, 26,000 residents call Bainbridge home. Among those residents is a growing mountain bike community.
While the island has a few trails here and there, nothing has specifically been built for mountain biking — until now. Thanks to an anonymous land donation totalling $1 million, mountain bikers will have a new trail system on Bainbridge Island: the Strawberry Hill Bike Park.
Balancing restoration and recreation
A plan has been in the works for over five years to provide a space specifically for mountain biking on Bainbridge Island. However, past plans and proposed locations fell through as the community struggled to secure a parcel of land for a trail system. While there was a recognized need for more trail access, there was also a need to restore the local forest habitat.
“We have a ton of forested land and open space on the island,” Lydia Roush told us. “The district manages 1,600 acres of land, and we’re pretty developed as well. So we have this wildland inner earth.”
Roush is the Park Services Division Director for the Bainbridge Island Metro Park and Recreation District. She oversees the district’s development of the Strawberry Hill Bike Park.
While the island has become a regular space for tourists and Seattle residents to experience a more natural setting on the Puget Sound, Bainbridge has previously struggled with forest health. Logging and farming were once huge industries, and Roush shared that the island has been entirely clear-cut three times. The current forests on the island are only 50–75 years old.
The result was an area without protected wilderness or much protected wildlife. Obviously, residents and organizations, such as Parks and Rec, would like to see healthy forests restored. And they are finding that recreation might be the ticket for doing just that.
“We know we don’t have [wilderness] habitat. We know we’re not supporting endangered species,” Roush said. “So it’s really easy to make that human wildlife interaction work and [pair] recreation with conservation.”
What Bainbridge does have is habitat and wildlife that thrive well with human interaction. Many struggling areas, like Strawberry Hill, where a strawberry farm was once located, actually need more human interaction. They need things like thinning and invasive species removal, which often won’t happen without another reason to head into the area.
On Bainbridge, that reason has become what many call the “forest escape” — a way for people to reconnect with nature while helping restore the health of the island’s forests. Adding trails to forests allows easier access to address the needs of the forests. And now Bainbridge has another reason — a mountain bike park.
Introducing the Strawberry Hill Bike Park
Bainbridge Parks and Rec oversees roughly 50 miles of trails, the lion’s share being multi-use. Roush shared that the island’s trails are frequented by runners, hikers, cyclists, and equestrians — she’s even seen sheep on one of the trails.
However, mountain bike-specific trails are lacking.
“We also realize that the mountain bikers — when you’re really going for it — want to tear down a trail, right? You need a space for that as well,” Roush said.
With a growing mountain biking community on Bainbridge Island, Parks and Rec realized this user group needs a space to unleash without being concerned for other trail users. The struggle was finding the space.
But thanks to an anonymous donor, that issue was resolved. Bainbridge was gifted a 10-acre parcel of land worth $1 million. The gift was given with the intention of building mountain bike trails.
The former 10 acres is located adjacent to the already established Strawberry Hill Park. The current park has amenities like tennis courts, baseball fields, a skatepark, and a dog park.
And now it will have a mountain bike park.
“It’s really nice because a parent can come and they can let one kid go to the mountain bike park, one kid go to the skate park, and one kid is practicing T-ball over here,” Roush told us.
Strawberry Hill Bike Park will take up roughly eight of the ten acres donated. The remaining acreage will be used to double the size of the dog park.
What will the new bike park offer?
Strawberry Hill Bike Park’s eight acres will house around one and a half miles of trails. Since the island doesn’t climb much above sea level, a wooden platform with descending ramps will be used as a starting hub. This will allow riders to gain speed down the three descending trails of their choice, dropping around 80 feet in elevation.
There will be three main descending trails: beginner, intermediate, and advanced. However, there will be a few offshoots from those main trails, such as another blue offshoot from the beginner trail and a double-black offshoot from the advanced trail.
The descending trails will follow a westward slope, with two climbing trails taking riders back to the top. The return trails will be mixed in with the descending trails, allowing quick access back to the top, regardless of the route chosen to descend. All trails are one-way directional and are mountain biking only.
The trails will be focused on flow, with plenty of berms and jumps, although there will also be some rocky technical sections. Strawberry Hill will also utilize “flyover” structures — a wooden bridge allowing a descending trail to go over the top of a climbing trail.
Along with the multiple descending trails, a dirt jump zone and skills areas are also in the works. Riders can expect to perfect skills on drops, skinnies, and rock gardens before hitting the trails.
Bainbridge Parks and Rec worked on Strawberry Hill’s design with Evergreen Mountain Bike Alliance. With the design complete, they contracted with Shire Built out of Bellingham, WA, to build the trails, which are expected to cost just over $400,000.
“Shire Built is doing a great job,” Roush said. “We feel very lucky that they got the bid, and we’ve been able to work with them. They’re super skilled.”
Aside from Shire Built, the local community has also been very involved in the project. Local mountain bike groups have been lending a hand, and students from nearby schools have worked on invasive species removal.
For Roush, seeing the community support Strawberry Hill physically and financially has been incredible.
“The community has really shown up,” Roush told us. “The district put in the seed money to get the design done and get things rolling, but the community is fundraising for this whole project.”
Bainbridge Parks and Rec and Shire Built hope to have the Strawberry Hill Bike Park open by July 4th.
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