History

Segregated Beach, Sewage Plant, Druggy hangout…. Mountain Bike Trails?

 That’s right Virginia Key has a long history, so how did it start?

 A long long time ago some illegal trails were created by ATV’s and Dirt Bikes in the North Point area. But the city was not very proud of those, they were eventually shut down.

 Later on it was discovered that there was something called the Virginia Key Master Plan Meeting. A couple of mountain bikers got together and went to that meeting. The bikers painted a pretty picture of how an old dump and dredge disposal area could be used to make mountain bike trails here in Miami. And then the bikers told the city the one thing that will make even the most conservative of politicians jump on the band wagon… IT WOULD COST THE CITY NOTHING!!!

 Needless to say the mountain bikers got the go ahead.

 7 years ago Bernard Riviere, (don’t call him Bernard he likes Frenchy) walked into the jungle that V.K was at the time and with an orange spray can started marking the trails.

Frenchy is who we like to call the architect of Virginia Key, he has been tracing and designing the trails since day one.

He has a vision no one else has when it comes to building trails where no one has ever put foot.

Today he still using a spray can telling us “ We are going to cut here, then drop there and go right up here before building a berm there” when most of us do not have a clue of what he’s talking about steering at bushes and trees. Did I mention Frenchy built close to 15 miles of trails at Oleta prior to VK?

 Now, 7 years into the making, we have over 7.5 miles of amazing trails, over 21 000 hours worth of volunteer hard work and a club V.K.B.C with over 450 members renewing every year their memberships.

 Not bad I’ll say !

The Island’s come a long way since 1940. It’s amazing that some of the land the park is built on didn’t even exist 100 years ago.