Photo Credit: Courtesy of Broward County Parks
A framed certificate hangs in the lobby at Markham Park & Target Range in Sunrise, Fla., attesting to a current Guinness World Record set at the park on December 4, 2011. That’s when American biker Zachary Hutelin performed the longest manual (or wheelie) on a bicycle, 209.2 meters (686 feet, 3 inches), more than double the previous record.
One scorching South Florida summer day, however, Park Manager V. Trevor Fell had other things on his mind as he strode past the certificate into his office a few feet away. He wanted to talk about one of the park’s latest, most ambitious projects, also bicycle related—4 miles of adaptive mountain-bike trails, which expand the existing 10 miles of trails and offer an alternative for bicyclists with disabilities. The park officially opened the adaptive trails in January 2015, and since then the new trails have proved popular not only with bikers who have disabilities, but also with first-time mountain bikers.
Fell is quick to point out that the park’s entire trail system, which dates to the early 1990s, is largely the work of a small group of volunteers, who still maintain the trails on an ongoing basis. “About 95 percent of the work on those trails is volunteer-driven,” says Fell. The park typically provides necessary supplies, while volunteers contribute the labor.