Discussion: MTB-O Mapping in Rocky Terrain

The ISOM MTB-O includes boulders including stony ground. It also has 3 levels of forest white, light green, green.

If no off-trail is allowed, what's the official and unofficial practice of having these features. Should they be translated 1-to-1 from a foot-o map?

I am translating a map with a lot of small boulders, rocky ground and stone walls (Mount Penn). It also has a lot of small patches of green in otherwise 'white' woods:

See here:
http://www.dvoa.org/cgi/gadget/reitti.cgi?act=map&...

Opinions? Rules? If I include every feature on ISOM mtb-o won't this be too cluttered?

Yes it would be cluttered but remember that ISMTBOM also applies to countries (namely in Europe) where you are allowed to go off track so the green is useful for depicting where going off track is a bad idea.

ISMTBOM only allows for one shade of green (30% otherwise it overshadows the rest of the map if it is a dominant feature). If off track riding is not allowed then our (by "our" I mean WA and Qld) standard practice is to use it with differing vegetation types (e.g. native forest versus plantations) to assist with navigation but it may be more useful if there are thick patches of bush that you cannot see through when riding.

Typical practice in my experience is to remove all the rocks unless they are useful for navigating (i.e. near tracks) and prominent. Same for cliffs. Stony ground would be used for areas where riding is allowed (open land).

The ISMTBOM spec hasn't addressed the issue that some countries allow off-track travel and others don't. Tell us what your situation is and then discussion can be more relevant. Certainly you're right that a rider doesn't need or want all the stuff that a foot-orienteer expects, and you can delete or hide a huge amount.

Thank you. It sounds like there are two mapping standards for off tracks travel allowed and on-tracks only events, but it's not explicit.

Basically, if you look at the map in the above link, how much detail would you keep to the map if you are making a map for a 'stay on tracks' event. In this case, there is a very accurate ISOM map. Are there any good examples of ISOM vrs ISOMTBOM maps in very rocky terrain?

I will take some liberty, but curious on what is the actual standard. It doesn't seem necessary to add stony ground or light vegetation when navigating on a trail.

In this case most of the detail is irrelevant. Take the approach "what needs to be on the map" rather than "what has to come off". Copy across roads and tracks, contours, streams and open land. Cover the whole map with light green and cut holes where there is open land. Convert the foot-o track symbols to MTBO ones, the translation may depend on your geology and how the tracks came about.

Further improvement will take fieldwork. Ride every track and record those that don't fit the general pattern. Record obstacles which require a dismount. Major features that hit you in the eye (from the track). The effort of this stage is your friend - the map will be more readable with less on.

Bear in mind that gruver is from NZ where they use green on MTBO maps as standard rather than white that the rest of the civilised word tends to use. White on a NZ map is bush that you're allowed to ride through.

What the spec says is to use green for dense trees, where its difficult to pass even pushing or carrying your bike. NZ generally has dense trees. Where it has been checked out to be passable (with a bike) it uses white. I don't know how dense your trees are Erik (from a biker's point of view) but your talk of stony ground suggests the same effect.

However the colour you use for forest is a red herring. The main thing is to leave off all that foot-orienteering stuff. What your riders need to know is how rideable the tracks are.

I would definitely get rid of all the rocks because they are distracting to a cyclist, plus the spec says they should be 70% black anyway (if they are useful to the rider), something that Qld orienteering failed to adhere to on the weekend - all the fences and buildings were 100% black!

If you have access to OCAD 12 it has an automatic convert to MTBO. It basically removes most of the detail and changes the trails to MTBO standards. It's not failsafe, and would still need fieldwork, but might be a good way to start.

you use red herring for forest? Don't color blind people complain? What are the cmyk values for red herring?

The red herring is a furphy. The colour for that is 70% black.

A furphy should be a blue circle - or asterisk in isom2017

furphy is a decent pint