uman Powered Trails, Inc. is a non-profit organization whose mission is:  “To develop and maintain first class sustainable and environmentally correct, human-powered, shared use trails for the La Crosse, WI region."

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Deberming Trails PDF Print E-mail
Written by Dan Luebke   
Saturday, 05 July 2008 18:24
Since we have been discussing "deberming" some of our older trails, we should probably discuss what we are trying to accomplish (or avoid).

Over time as trails see heavy use, the tread where foot and bike travel passes over becomes more compact and eventually becomes lower than the outside edge of the trail (this is bad).  Once the tread portion becomes lower than the out-slope of the trail, water tends to either puddle or flow down the actual tread when it rains causing erosion.

By "DEBERMING" the trail we are reestablishing the out-slope of the trail so that water will sheet across the trail and down the hill as it would  naturally before the trail was there, or when the trail was first constructed.



Once the deberming is done, the finished product should look the same as when the trail was first constructed.  The trails built by Human Powered Trails are usually always full bench cut trails.  This is the best technique for long term sustainability since we are constructing the trail to allow water to sheet across the tread, just as it would naturally; instead of trying to control or channel the water, which would cause erosion.

Here is a diagram of a full bench cut trail from the Trail Solutions book written by IMBA.

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