Innovation continued


Eoin Hogan – Making Trail Signs Come Alive Amy Camp Amy Camp – Trail Towns, the Next Generation


Amy Camp is an expert in the concept of “trail towns.” An innovator through and through, she was among the  trails. Now that the trail town model is gaining popularity across the country she has a message that will be shocking to - ize that they aren’t everything. Camp has seen more than one trail town through its infancy and watched it grow. After doing so she has realized if success is solely measured in dollars, the expectations turn away from fostering a “trail culture” and community nourish- ment as a whole. Camp, who serves as both a consultant on trail projects and trail tourism, believes that when trail com- munities focus too much on the bottom line, they are robbed  Camp is pioneering what she calls “Triangle Trails,” which focus on the triple bottom line— people, planet, and -  economic ones.


Camp will be speaking more on this idea during a TRAILSNext® Series talk at the 2019 International Trails Symposium and Training Institute.


www.cycleforward. org.


Most cyclists are familiar with the app Strava, which is known as the “social network for athletes.” Eoin Hogan,  in Ireland, is utilizing the popularity of this app alongside   technology that allows you to “tap and pay” with your credit card in retail stores, allows cyclists to tap on trail signs with their smartphone and connect to the relevant Strava page. The signs are for installation at the bottom of a number of the most popular hills in Clare. The signs includes general information on the approaching hill including the distance, height gain, gradient and maximum gradient, and the Strava page will show the fastest cyclists up the hill to try to beat. The NFC chip technology works so that the signs do not need a power source, but rather use the phone’s own power to trigger Strava.


These innovative interactive signs are part of a larger program  www.clare-getsidetracked.ie.


Sample signs providing route data for cyclists 38 SPRING 2019 AmericanTrails.org


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