Knobby wheels welcome: City gearing up for mountain bike trail

Adrenaline junkies on two knobby-tread wheels may soon find their promised land in Eden Prairie.

Eden Prairie is making plans to create a three-mile, entry-level mountain biking trail at Cedar Hill Park in the southwestern part of the city. It’s also considering a longer, more challenging second phase across Eden Prairie Road on Flying Cloud Airport property.

It’s all preliminary for now. No one has designed the Cedar Hills Park trail, and city officials aren’t sure whether the Metropolitan Airports Commission, which owns the airport, would allow mountain biking on its property.

But a proposal presented to the Eden Prairie City Council by Parks Director Amy Markle in an informal workshop on March 4 would have the Cedar Hills Park trail designed this year, with construction in 2026.

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The city has already budgeted $20,000 this year for Cedar Hills work, which could include trail design, and more than $400,000 for the park is in the city’s capital improvement program (CIP) for 2026. Phase two construction, if allowed, would take place in 2027, Markle estimated.

Ray Samide, for one, is glad to see the city taking this first step. 

The 26-year Eden Prairie resident, now retired, is an avid mountain biker. He used the famous line from the movie “Field of Dreams” in predicting how such a project might fare with the local biking community: 

“If you build it, he will come!” a disembodied voice says to Iowa corn farmer Ray Kinsella in the 1989 Academy Award-nominated movie.

If the city builds an off-road trail, bikers will come, Samide said.

Parks official touts benefits

You might say that a mountain biking trail is right in Markle’s wheelhouse. Just before coming to Eden Prairie in late 2023, Markle finished a signature project called the Taft Off-Road Bike Park in Richfield, where she previously worked.

Cedar Hills Park is in a hilly area of southwestern Eden Prairie that decades ago was home to the Cedar Hills Golf Course and, in winter, a ski hill. Markle said about 16 acres of the park could accommodate a three-mile, entry-level mountain biking trail, separated from nearby pedestrian trails.

She said there is also room for a 1.5-acre skills park, where youngsters and mountain biking novices could get a small taste of rollers, jumps, small obstacles, and other features typically found on mountain biking trails.

She sees the proposed trail as a benefit to Eden Prairie residents’ long-term health, especially since biking is a sport that crosses many generations.

“It can connect people of all abilities to nature. It’s good for balance, mobility, good for your mental health – an intergenerational opportunity,” Markle said about biking.

While some suburban high schools have even formed competitive mountain biking teams, she said, it’s still largely an individual sport – one that youngsters can take up without the fear of being cut from a team.

“I think, too, it’s something we’re missing in our park system,” she added.

Some suburbs ahead of Eden Prairie

In fact, Eden Prairie is relatively late to the game when it comes to mountain biking trails.

There are about two dozen mountain biking tracks or trails in the Twin Cities area, according to Minnesota Trails, a quarterly outdoor magazine and website featuring the state’s parks, trails, and rivers. Two of the newer trails are just across Eden Prairie’s border: five miles of trail in Lone Lake Park in Minnetonka and six miles of trail in Braemar Park in Edina. 

Growth of the sport is especially evident among youth. The Minnesota Cycling Association (MCA), which offers youth mountain biking programs, says more than 2,600 student-athletes and 1,300 coaches participate in its activities.

Mountain-biking enthusiast Samide said it’s “huge” to have a trail within easy biking distance from home and that he’s excited the city “is finally doing something.”

“I think this project is a great first step,” he said about the city’s proposal. “I think it will be a stepping stone to getting more people riding bikes and hopefully lead to additional trails in the future.”

John Jarvis, another longtime resident working to grow the biking community in Eden Prairie, said he, too, is excited about the city’s proposal. Jarvis and others have created a limited-group Facebook page called “Bike Eden Prairie” to bring more awareness to and grow EP’s biking infrastructure.

What are the obstacles?

Markle’s proposal has its challenges. Getting MAC’s approval to create a longer, more difficult second-phase trail on airport property near Cedar Hills Park is one of them. The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) has strict regulations about activities allowed on airport property.

Another challenge is trail design. That includes making the trail challenging enough to attract repeat visits and draw mountain bikers away from what Markle called “bandit trails” in sensitive-to-erosion conservation areas they already use in Eden Prairie.

Public engagement is also critical, Markle said. So is partnering with other organizations, ensuring mountain bikers feel a sense of ownership of the trail, help self-police it, and volunteer for maintenance and improvements.

Markle, the staff liaison to the city’s Parks, Recreation and Natural Resources Commission, said she would like to start a Mountain Bike Committee and draw help or expertise from Eden Prairie Schools, Three Rivers Park District, Bicycle Alliance of Minnesota, MCA, peer cities, and others. Samide said it looks like the city is partnering with all the right people.

There is also the challenge of incorporating park resource management into the concept, such as the ongoing removal of invasive species like buckthorn, which would be a benefit overall to Cedar Hills Park, said Markle.

While Markle said more City Council review is ahead, early reactions have been positive.

At the March 4 informal meeting, council members said they liked that the mountain biking trail has a lower price tag than many park improvements, such as hard-surface courts.

“I think this whole thing is pretty exciting,” Mayor Ron Case said at the meeting.

Markle said conversations with MAC will be held this spring, and design of the first phase would probably be done next fall and winter.