Work continues on the series of trails that pepper Sugarloaf Mountain in Nevada City, as talk of the construction of a parking lot moves forward.
The trail system has yet to be thoroughly complete, with Section 1, coming in at 262’ in length not yet constructed and others including Section 5—a skid road—and Section 6 at 781’ in length are in progress.
Nevada City Council Mayor Gary Petersen and Councilmember Doug Fleming met Tuesday as part of the Community Services Committee and approved moving forward with the parking lot which would be constructed at a site at 714 Coyote Street. The city council approved the construction in its March 25, 2025 meeting.
Currently, parking for the trails is available on the sides of the road as well as at the Rood Administration Building.
“What we have there now is a huge road...dirt road,” said Dawn Zydonis, Parks and Recreation Manager for Nevada City. “And then the parking lot the council has approved and contracted with Hansen Bros. And I am sure you’re aware they’re busy with the project on the Broad Street (Y).”
Zydonis said all involved parties are waiting for the Broad Street project to “mellow out,” at which time Hansen Bros. will advise the council they are ready to take on the parking lot construction.
“It’s a location you can’t really see from the road,” said City Manager Sean Grayson of the parking lot location. “It’s a historical party spot so we might have to close the gate at night. There’s going to be some changes there.”
Grayson said the implementation of chains or bollards could be possible for the site, which he added would allow for greater visibility when entering or exiting off of Coyote Street.
“The whole project has to be completed by the end of the year, December 31, for our funding,” Zydonis added. “We did already get an extension...that was a while ago. As you know, from the start we applied for the funding and it took a really long time to get through the federal requirements.”
The road has been bumpy on the way to completing the trail system project, due to privately owned land adjacent to the trails as well as the approval to construct a new courthouse on the same vein. Additionally, many parts of the mountain are covered in dead or dying branches that obscure certain parts of the trail, introducing fire hazard. Zydonis said there are also a number of transients who make residence on the hill, creating their own off-shoots of the main, sanctioned trails.
“When we started this project we had a vision of this trail almost being like a tunnel, beautiful manzanita, and what we learned is they cut through the route and then we had Snowmageddon and they cut all of manzanita on the route to fall onto it,” said Zydonis. “We realized we needed to do a much bigger clearing project than when we planned when we originally applied for the grant. But when we put that out to bid, it came in at more than half of our grant amount so that wasn’t going to work out.”
It’s been reported that some visitors to the trail get confused by the sometimes unclear trail, which for the most part is without markings or indicators. Some even end up on private property or in people’s yards, which Zydonis said can be corrected with the addition of plants to more clearly guide path walkers or signage; the final decision has yet to be made.
“We are definitely going to be (doing) some mitigation,” Zydonis said. “All we need to do is put some brush there, and boundary signs. It’s been people legitimately not knowing the trail, not just homeless. I am not claiming that the homeless are going to stay on the trail. But the trail users who actually want to be on the trail will stay on the trail.”
According to the staff report issued for the May 6 meeting: “The portion of the trail that is on an easement to 631 Coyote Street (the current USFS Headquarters) will eventually need to be realigned and the easement removed. This is because the Judicial Council of California (JCC) intends to acquire the property for the new Nevada City Courthouse and it needs to be unencumbered.”
Again, all issues will need to be resolved before the end of the calendar year in order for the city to receive the grant funding issued for use in the project.
“Section 1 of the trail needs a Caltrans permit before the contractor can work in that area,” said Zydonis. “The city is in the process of sending a response with information that Caltrans has requested.”
Skating toward the future
Lon Peterson, Assistant City Manager, provided an update to the committee in the same meeting, saying the available funding total of $750,000 is anticipated to provide for the first phase of the project, which would include skatepark land acquisition/easement work, site design, environmental review, community outreach and engagement, installation of the permanent skate elements, installation of fencing, installation of lighting, and installation of a bathroom and snack shack.
The city has drafted a Request for Proposal (RFP) for the project while staff reviews and refines its document to make sure the proposal encompasses the desired elements, namely the expectations of the community as well as the technical requirements for such a commitment.
“The scope of it is that engagement is a priority and we’re asking to build it, but what we’re really asking is for someone to come and partner with us to work with the community and understand the needs of the community and put together a skatepark that meets those needs,” Peterson said.
Peterson said that community outreach and involvement is of the utmost importance, and a Request for Quote will be released this month for any company wishing to be involved in the construction of the park, which is slated to be built on Providence Mine Road, adjacent to the Bodhi Hive facility.
“There’s also a constraint with funding,” Peterson added. “It’s not an open checkbook. One of the pieces of that is that the (park) features can be utilized by different skill sets.”
Phase one of the project incorporates initial community input, leading into the second which would be the design phase. Once that is settled, pre-construction and construction will happen before the grand opening, for which Peterson said there is no set date; it all depends on how the rest of the process goes.
“As far as anybody who bids on this project...we’ll have criteria that we select a vendor—we encourage anybody to submit to this RFP when it comes out—if they are qualified and want to have the opportunity to get this project, then I encourage them to do so,” Peterson said. “We haven’t even put out the RFP so we haven’t preselected anybody.”