I'd much rather they built separate trails for those bikers who want to go fast and hard instead of letting them onto hiking trails. Hiking trails are fine for the bikers who want to take it easy, but I'd rather not get run over by the extreme folks! Nor, I presume, do the extreme folks want to run into me!
Congratulations to the bike club for winning the grant!
I think the grant is for mountain bikers only trail. I sympathize your concern because i'm both a hiker and a mountain biker. Many of the trails in this area of Knoxville is multi-used and I always give hikers, trail runners, and horse riders the right a way. Unfortunately, there always a couple bikers that gives the rest a bad name and to balance this out, there always a couple hikers and equestrian users that give their own group a bad name. Me? I try to find the middle ground. I love to hike amazing trails and I love to ride bikes on amazing trails. I want to preserve and maintain trails for all users without destroying ecosystem, and shutting out other users access to the trails and the wilderness. It getting harder and harder in our society as the population grows. Maybe I can learn from people and help us all find that middle ground when it come to multi-use trails. I don't work on trail days for hikers since I help build and maintain trails for cross-country mountain bikers. When I see hikers working on hiking only trails, I shake their hands!