recreation news

New 5-mile mountain bike trail gets rolling through woods and prairies of Denton

Person riding a bike through Marion Sansom Park

There'll soon be a new place to do this.

Photo courtesy of Fort Worth Mountain Bikers' Association

A 240-acre mountain biking space is under way in Denton, on the Hartlee Field Property next to the Clear Creek Natural Heritage Center.

The city's first official mountain biking area, it will consist of five to seven miles of trails running through hills, woods, flat spaces, and open prairies, city officials say. There are two small stock ponds on the property, as well.

It's part of a Denton city initiative to make sure there are bicycle trails all over town, connecting the lakes, the greenbelt, and major thoroughfares. Currently, there are more than 200 bike trails throughout the city, but the plan is to eventually double this number.

Drew Huffman, Denton assistant director of Parks & Recreation over Operations and Planning, says the Hartlee Field Property is the perfect location for mountain biking trails, but not just because of the varied terrain. The land has been sitting there largely unused used for decades.

“The Waste Water Department bought the property in the mid-’90s for a future waste water treatment plant,” he says. “Through their master planning, they decided that a treatment plant may be necessary, but it may not be necessary for 10 to 40 years. Or, it may never need to be built. Or, it may need to be just 30 or 40 acres, not 240 acres.”

Huffman says he used to work in the Waste Water Department and knew about the property all along.

“As soon as I moved over to the parks department, we worked on a memorandum of understanding to use the property for mountain biking trails,” he says. “If they’re not going to use all of it for what it was originally planned for, a mountain bike course would be great to put there. If a treatment plant is ever needed, the trails could go around it, and a fence could be built to keep people out.”

The bulk of the construction of the mountain bike trails will be done by local residents.

“We’ve had a lot of interest by volunteers to help with this project,” Huffman said. “Over 130 volunteers have signed up to help build the trails. They are raising awareness, posting signs, trimming brush, marking and planning where the trails will go, and installing trails,” using such hand tools as pruners, hand saws, shovels, and loppers.

“The volunteers are really excited,” Huffman says.

They hope to finish the project by December 2021, he says — or earlier.

parks sports

MOVING ON UP

Texas rises through the ranks of most innovative states, says new report

Photo via Getty Images

Texas has seen year-over-year improvement on an annual list that ranks states based on their innovation economies.

The Lone Star State has again taken a step up on an annual report that ranks the most and least innovative states in the country — this time cracking the top 15.

Texas ranked No. 15 in personal finance site WalletHub's 2023’s Most and Least Innovative States ranking. It's a steady improvement for the state, which ranked No. 16 in 2022 and No. 17 in 2021.

The report analyzed the 50 states and the District of Columbia and how each performed across 22 key metrics, including population of STEM professionals, venture capital investment activity, number of technology companies, patents per capita, and more. The data was pulled from the U.S. Census Bureau, Bureau of Labor Statistics, National Science Foundation, National Center for Education Statistics, United States Patent and Trademark Office, and other records.

Here's how Texas performed at a glance:

No. 18 – for share of STEM professionals
No. 16 – for projected STEM job demand by 2030
No. 25 – for eighth grade math and science performance
No. 21 – for share of science and engineering graduates aged 25 or older
No. 13 – for share of technology companies
No. 31 – for R&D spending per capita
No. 18 – venture capital funding per capita

For the 11th year, Texas won Site Selection Magazine's Governor's Cup, the governor's office announced earlier this year. The award, which Texas has won 19 times since its inception in 1978, recognizes the nation’s top-performing state for job-creating business relocations and expansions.

"Texas truly is America’s economic engine, and we stand apart as a model for the nation. When choosing where to relocate or expand their businesses, more and more innovative industry leaders find themselves at home in our state," Governor Greg Abbott says in a news release about the award.

"I congratulate the exceptional economic development teams at the local, regional, and state level who have worked so diligently to attract and retain these growing businesses and the jobs they create in diverse communities across this great state," he continues.

The most innovative states included the District of Columbia, which ranked at No. 1, followed by Massachusetts, Washington, Maryland, and California, respectively. The least innovative state was identified as Mississippi, followed by Louisiana, North Dakota, West Virginia, and Arkansas, respectively.

Source: WalletHub

Access to quality education is a significant contributor to each state's innovation economy, the experts say in the report.

"Investing in education, particularly K-12 but also at the University level, it is no accident that innovative ecosystems develop in states with strong education systems and research universities," says David L. Deeds, professor at the University of St. Thomas in Minneapolis. "These institutions build strong capable modern workforces that attract capital, and jobs and create innovations. The benefits do not happen overnight, in fact, they take years if not decades, but consider what The UC’s or the University of Texas at Austin have meant for the development of premier innovative ecosystems."

Texas WalletHub innovation