Cities on the Mississippi River Trail are shifting into bike trails promotion gear.
Minnesota cities along the Mississippi River Trail believe they could gain a lot of bicycle tourism dollars with some advertising moxie, and state officials have developed a marketing plan to help them start promoting their trail stops.
An online trail-marketing toolbox, recently announced by the bicycling section of the Minnesota Department of Transportation, is being offered to riverside towns, including more than 20 in the metro area between Hastings and Elk River.
“We are trying to superimpose a trail on top of existing roads and trails and repurpose it into a nationally significant route,” said the section planner, Dan Collins. “The marketing piece is key in this new reality.”
The Mississippi River Trail (MRT) begins on bike paths in Lake Itasca State Park and follows the Mississippi through 10 states along 3,000 miles of trails, mostly on paved road shoulders, to the Gulf of Mexico. Minnesota has 817 miles of the Mississippi River Trail, including 174 miles (100 on trails) on both sides of the river between Elk River and Hastings.
So far, five metro area cities have signed up for MnDOT’s training on trail marketing, Collins said. They are Hastings, Anoka, Ramsey, Elk River and Monticello.
“Bicycle tourism is hot,” said Hastings parks director Barry Bernstein. “We would like to become the Lanesboro of the north.”
Lanesboro is considered the state’s premier example of bike trail marketing. It has developed a tourism-based economy since 1986, when the first part of the Root River State Trail opened.
Minneapolis also has been a leader in promoting bicycle tourism. Other cities such as Hastings and Ramsey also are beginning to promote their trails to attract cycling business.
Bike trails are “a big draw and we definitely want to tell people our story,” said Shaun Murphy, a Minneapolis trail coordinator. That “story,” viewable on the city’s website, includes 1,200 green rental bikes available at 116 stations around town, 85 miles of city-encircling bike trails, and 81 miles of striped bike lanes along city streets. The city also has three ambassadors who hold bike rodeos and promote bicycling in talks to schools and businesses.
The green bikes are rented by Nice Ride Minnesota, which found that more than 40 of its daily bike rentals are by visitors living outside Minnesota, said Bill Dossett, Nice Ride’s director. “The most likely place to see the bikes is on bike paths on downtown bridges over the Mississippi,” he said.
Lanesboro’s experience
Bike tourism has ignited an economic renaissance in Lanesboro, where the farm economy was faltering in 1986, when a stretch of the Root River State Trail opened, said Julie Kiehne, head of the area Chamber of Commerce.
“The bike trail was the catalyst to get the ball rolling, to bring this revitalization to Lanesboro,” Kiehne said. “As more segments were paved and connected, more bikers came, creating more demand for places to stay and eat and have evening entertainment.” Now the city’s theaters and artisans also draw tourists, she said.
The 60-mile Root River and Harmony-Preston state bike trails are managed by the state Department of Natural Resources. The agency’s most recent economic impact report said tourist bikers using the trails spent almost $2.3 million a summer between 2007 and 2009, while local bikers spent more than $46,000 a summer.
Nearly 60 percent of the bikers surveyed were age 41 to 65, and about 70 percent said the trail was “very important in their decision to visit Lanesboro.” What they liked most was the bucolic scenery, wildlife and peaceful environment.
The same report noted that accommodation sales taxes collected in Fillmore County (where Lanesboro captures the bulk of lodging sales) amounted to $176,000 in the trail’s first year, when Lanesboro had one bed and breakfast. Fast forward more than two decades to 2009, when the city had 15 bed-and-breakfast inns and about 15 motels: Lodging tax collections had soared to almost $5 million. Fillmore County’s food-and-drink taxes hit nearly $11.2 million in 2009.
Kiehne, whose visitor’s bureau sits by the trail, has a copy of MnDOT’s marketing toolbox on her desk. Although the Root River Trail ends 17 miles from the Mississippi River Trail, Kiehne is hoping to capture some spinoff business.
“The MRT project is phenomenal. It will mean a huge impact not only on Minnesota but the whole country,” she said.
“It’s a fabulous way to promote fitness, exercise, involving youth and getting them off computer games and outside.” By Jim Adams, Star Tribune
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