Te Miro Mountain Bike Park is located roughly 20km from Cambridge, making it Cambridge's closest Mountain Bike park.
The Te Miro MTB club, which organises park events and all track maintenance, is a volunteer group that works to promote mountain biking in the Waikato region.
Because the club is a volunteer group and the Te Miro MTB Park is free for all to ride, it relies on businesses to donate money and resources to keep the park running and tracks maintained.
A member from the Te Miro MTB club reached out on Facebook, asking if there was anyone who would be able to help update the maps located around the park. Volly Solutions, who is lucky enough to have the Te Miro MTB park close by, knew we could help out!
The process started by figuring out exactly what the park was looking for - either updating the old map or creating a completely new map. In the end, we decided to give the map a full refresh.
Because the park has had the addition of some new trails and some old trails getting closed, there was a bit of work to make sure we had all of the correct GPS location data for the tracks.
To start the process off, we decided to capture an up-to-date aerial image of the park (because we are a drone mapping company…). With council permission, we collected aerial imagery of the Mountain Bike Park. This updated image was used for the background and to see any tracks that were not covered by trees.
Image: Aerial imagery of Te Miro Mountain Bike Park captured using a drone
The next step was the GPS data collection of all the tracks. One of Volly Solutions staff members, Hamish, spent a good few days biking and running the park, collecting GPS data of each track, ensuring all data was up-to-date.
“You think that because the Mountain Bike Park is hidden away in the trees it is not very big, man was I wrong! I found so many new trails that I had never ridden before, which was awesome!”
Image: Resting at the top of the park - with GPX/GPS data recorded on the left
Once all of the data was collected, it was uploaded into our drawing software, while making sure it was all referenced correctly. From there, the next step was to make the map look good, but at the same time, practical for all members coming to ride the park.
This meant making sure all tracks were coloured in the correct grading colours, all the correct arrows showing the directions around the tracks, and all tracks being labelled with their names.
The final product is a simple but effective map, showing all that is needed for riders to have a great time riding on the tracks, and know where they are!
Image: The final map printed for the park
Happy riding!