The controversy also comes at a time in Southern California when a growing number of cities and counties and state and federal agencies allow some off-road mountain biking on dirt park trails that hikers and equestrians also use. The city of Los Angeles does not.
That, said Max Baum, the 77-year-old chairman of the mayor's advisory commission on bicycles and a lifelong cyclist, is plain old discrimination.
"People are entitled to baseball, tennis and other things in the park," Baum argued. "Why should we restrict mountain bikes?"
The Concerned Off-Road Bicyclists Assn. and other mountain bike advocates have lobbied for off-road access to recreational areas previously closed to them. The association was formed in 1987 to push for access to the Santa Monica Mountains, which was eventually granted several years later.
Although figures on the number of accidents involving mountain bikes are hard to come by, the problems associated with mountain bikes have been exaggerated in areas where they are now allowed, some officials said.
"Very few [accidents] can be attributed to mountain bikers," said Hayden Sohm, superintendent of the Malibu section of the California state parks system. "I'm not naive. There are still some problems out there, but we've made a 180-degree change in terms of perception. If managed properly, they can be a positive usage."
The Los Angeles Recreation and Park Commission several years ago made an off-road mountain bike trail project one of its goals. But the effort sputtered along, slowed by a change in top management of the Recreation and Parks Department, which the citizens commission oversees.
In trying to pull together a pilot project, three community meetings were held last year--in West Los Angeles, the San Fernando Valley and Griffith Park--to gauge public reaction. Opinion was decidedly against mountain bikes. Emotions flared at the sessions, which in total drew more than 500 people. Such groups as the Los Angeles chapter of the Sierra Club weighed in against the bicycles.
Department officials, after surveying city parks, focused on only two-- Elysian Park and Ernest E. Debs Regional Park near Montecito Heights--for a pilot program because of their size and hilly terrain. An assistant department general manager, George Stigile, said the effort initially would focus on Elysian Park.
