Ride Dungog president Chloe Chick says future of Dungog could be fuelled by bikes

According to Ride Dungog president Chloe Chick, the newly opened flow tracks bought over a thousand different riders into town.

"We had a tracker on the trails on Saturday, we had about a thousand bikes down it," Mrs Chick said.

After a season of higher than normal levels of rainfall, this is a good indication for the coming winter season, according to Mrs Chick.

As a result of this rain damage, the Dungog Common Recreational Land Manager has funded the safety revamping of two of the tracks, one was completed for the long-weekend.

The track that was completed and ready for use is called Jump Street, this is a blue graded flow track.

Work on the second track, Easy Street, is set to start on Tuesday, June 14. This is a green graded flow track.

Ride Dungog is aiming to have this revamp finished by the time school holidays come around.

For Chloe Chick, this is the start for Dungog to get a bicycle fuelled bouncing back from the COVID slump.

"I think a lot of people felt like the revival for Dungog was COVID related. The initial boom happened in the COVID period. I think this weekend has demonstrated that Dungog's got some magic," She said.

"There's magic in biking in Dungog. We need to, as a community, harness it and work together to keep it."

The weekend also marked the first weekend where new signage was implemented throughout the common, however it isn't all finished yet.

According to Mrs Chick only half a dozen of the 40 have been put out, focusing on the areas where people are more likely to visit.

"Over the next few weeks the whole network will be finished, at the moment they're just concentrated on the high flow areas," She said.

Unfortunately this coincides with Dungog's iconic Tempest Bicycles moving out of town, Mrs Chick see's this as a loss but also as an opportunity for entrepreneurs.

"They've had to endure the really wet season, the COVID lockdown. It's unfortunate that our bounce back is basically the week that they have left. But with that lies opportunity for the next entrepreneur," She said.

The biggest challenge that Ride Dungog faces is getting all of the Dungog community working together to keep the tracks maintained.

Keeping the Common's tracks maintained and of a high quality will bring people to town, according to Mrs Chick.

"High quality tracks bring people to town. Low quality tracks are a problem. Everybody's going to have a role to play, from making sure shops are open to funding the tracks," She said.

The future for Ride Dungog revolves around working with the Dungog Common to maintain the current tracks and plan for the future.