SixZeroSixOne profile

So, Mike, does writing for NSMB mean you've finally found a well paying job or are you still being suckered? 😉

> Who wouldn't want a fresh set of Minions? Maxxis have been a great partner (they make Pistons & Pivots possible, after all) and until the end of November, all MTB tires are 20% off (US only).

Gee thanks 🤨

Not necessarily disagreeing with you, but the specific user I'm aware of justified adding the trail data to OSM on public safety grounds, meaning the maps need to reflect reality on the ground, and the legality or otherwise is irrelevant. 

If someone is lost or injured, then they need to know the layout of the land so, for example, they can more accurately call in their position to 911. 

I can understand that position

Funnily enough, I've just returned from a similar road-trip and rode the Palisade Plunge then the Whole Enchilada two days days later. 

Strava tells me the Palisade Plunge took me 4.5hrs elapsed time whereas the Whole Enchilada took me 5.25hrs elapsed (both starting from shuttle drop off time).

(I opted to avoid the first "cross country" section across the Mesa top, so that saved some time/distance - from what I'd read, that section is a bit meh)

Overall, I'd say the Plunge (or technically, the Rim section) was more interesting riding but maybe not for anyone scared of heights or exposure (I rated it as more exposed than the Portal trail...)

Good article Dave

At a slight tangent, it seems like a user on Open Street Maps is on a mission to map and name all trails on the NS, irrespective of the trail status. 

So many "unsanctioned" trails are now popping up on many different mapping apps (including Trailforks and Strava) which use the underlying OSM data, so they aren't going to stay "secret" for very long.

I obviously don't know how to shop for bike parts - I've just paid slightly under 100 bucks for a single disc rotor and around 80 bucks for a single set of pads. WTF! 😯

> Every shop selling and fitting gravel bikes should have the Fall Line R in stock.

Doesn't seem to be available in 27.2mm diameter...

Lol, was Georgia referring Wade or the trails and stunts when she mentioned relics ;-)

Stunning photos and nice to see it's not just bros you ride with 😉

Thanks for the tips! I don't have kids so I'll skip the school board nominations.

Posted by: syncro

Posted by: SixZeroSixOne

I thought this was only available (in Canada) to "pension" income - so, when she retires (about 4 years after me) we can do this for her work DB pensions. It's the intervening few years until she retires that I was curious about...

(I believe incoming splitting in the US is different in that it's not restricted to pension income - if I've got that wrong please let me know!)

Yes sort of, sorry, I'm thinking of income splitting for investment income and using something called a spousal loan. It's not something I'm super familiar with as it doesn't apply to me, but I am aware of it. You may be too far along to take advantage of it but it could be worth a look.

https://www.rbcwealthmanagement.com/en-ca/insights/how-income-splitting-can-create-tax-savings

The Wealthsimple page on income splitting gives some good general info too. 

https://www.wealthsimple.com/en-ca/learn/how-income-splitting-works

Yeah, I've now read up on it and seems any sort of income or pension income splitting is not gonna work for me now, or is too much hassle (with too much risk of getting it wrong) for me - and what would only be marginal benefit a short period of time. I'll look into pension splitting again when she approaches retirement....

Posted by: syncro

Don’t think about pension income and simply treat it as income.

The advantage to splitting is it can take one spouse out of a higher income tax bracket and put them into a lower one. I’m sure there are some free online calculators available that will do the math for you and show you how much you can save on tax. If the discrepancy between your incomes is fairly high then there’s probably a fair amount of tax to be saved.

I thought this was only available (in Canada) to "pension" income - so, when she retires (about 4 years after me) we can do this for her work DB pensions. It's the intervening few years until she retires that I was curious about...

(I believe incoming splitting in the US is different in that it's not restricted to pension income - if I've got that wrong please let me know!)

I.e. a 40k + 40k joint income pays less tax than a 20k + 60k joint income.

I've read some of those TaxTips links and I've been playing around with the TaxTips tax calculator but I still don't really know what I'm doing! 

It seems to favour those couples where the elder person retires first but still has higher income than the younger person (eg older, higher income male vs younger wife with less income cos of child rearing which was a lot more typical generations ago) - which I guess makes sense.

In my case, Mrs6061 will have more income than me (salary) and overall we seem to save tax without pension income splitting.

I worked think that the CRA website has the details.

Yeah, it does. But not in a simplistic way that I can understand!

Can someone explain pension income splitting like I'm a five year old?

My situation:

I'm 60 and still working but likely to retire within the next 6-12 months. My other half is 56 and will be working full time until she's 60.

When I retire, I'll have a defined benefit/final salary pension ( plus I have an RRSP, a small TFSA and some savings, the obviously, CPP/OAS sometime later).

My pension will be about a quarter of Mrs6061's salary, yet apparently I can "share" part of my pension with her so she gets a pension credit she wouldn't otherwise be entitled to.

Is that all there is to it?

(I'll probably have some follow up questions as I weigh up the options about timing retirement...)

I can't quite picture where that specific rock is. Is it at the top of the short, steep climb towards the end of the trail??

(If so, I can sorta understand the need to "dumb the trail down", otherwise I can't think of any other feature of FA which isn't already "dark blue")

There's a huge new building going in judging by the freshly poured concrete foundations I saw a few weeks ago when I road my gravel bike up to the top. I presume it's the new gondola station. 

Flying down Mountain Highway in the dark on my gravel bike with a little handlebar mounted front light was, er, interesting when the road suddenly become two long truck ruts though I'm surprised that most of the road was in pretty good shape.

FWIW, Cycling News is reporting CRC/Wiggle will now only serve the UK...

Posted by: Kever

Just checked Trailforks and can confirm there are some trails that have appeared on the map that shouldn't be there.  "Sheriff of Seymour" should reach out to Trevor to have them removed.

I'm curious. How have you determined what should/should not be on Trailforks? 

IIRC, you do trail work in Cypress, so West Van and BPP rather than BC Parks/DMV/LSCR/Crown...have West Van/BPP got a list of approved trails and anything not on that list is verboten? If so, do either org have a public map showing the legal trails? Do they show which trails bikes are/are not allowed on?

I ask as DNV have publicly available trail maps which do not include a lot of the generally agreed sanctioned trails but their maps actually span other land owners so it's not as straightforward. And the DNV maps do not specify whether bikes are banned on some trails.

They may have the clout to close it off on paper but know they would die a thousand cuts trying to win the game of wack a mole to enforce it. Their spending on staff to try and enforce anything would go up exponentially from just doing some trail work.

This, sorta, is the point I was making earlier. Frankly, I'm pretty sure land managers know about most, if not all, of these un-sanctioned trails but have no practical way of dealing with them (and I'm sure they realize that as well). 

So keeping them "secret" won't be keeping them secret from land managers. However, the sheer number of un-sanctioned trails shows there is significant demand for more trails which is not being met thru "legal" means. 

And we (as tax paying members of the public) should be reminding (public) land managers they are not addressing these unmet needs (so hiding the trails also downplays the pent up demand).

On the North Shore specifically, it's somewhat of a blessing and a curse that so many different organizations own/manage the land cos if a land manager DOES throw resources at closing down un-sanctioned trails, then those trail builders can just move into a different land management jurisdiction and, by the same token, this also makes it a lot more difficult to put in a coherent trail network which may need to span multiple land jurisdictions for topological reasons.