Ambassador Guidelines

Being an Ambassador is about stewardship, accuracy, and local knowledge.

A good Ambassador helps answer questions like:

• What trails actually belong in this area?
• What are the common local names?
• Which trails are bike-legal?
• Which trails are closed, seasonal, restricted, or sensitive?
• Which difficulty ratings best match local expectations?
• Which trails are duplicates, oddball map artifacts, or not really trails at all?
• Which sub-areas make sense to local riders?

The goal is not to make the map match one person's favorite loop. The goal is to make Unridden useful for the whole community.

Ambassadors may help define the general boundary of an Unridden area.

Area boundaries do not need to be perfect. They are mainly used to help Unridden find and import candidate trails. Think "good enough to catch the right trail network," not "parcel survey for a courtroom drama."

When defining boundaries, consider:

• The commonly understood riding area
• Nearby trail systems that should or should not be included
• City, region, forest, resort, or land manager boundaries
• Natural divisions such as highways, rivers, ridgelines, or access points
• Whether the area is too large and should be split into multiple areas

Some areas contain smaller trail networks or zones. Ambassadors may define sub-areas to help users understand and track progress more clearly.

For example, a larger area such as Bend might include sub-areas like Phil's, Wanoga, Mt. Bachelor, Horse Ridge, and others.

Sub-areas should generally reflect names that local riders actually use. Not every area needs sub-areas.

Ambassadors help decide which trails should be enabled or disabled in an area.

Trails may be disabled if they are:

• Not bike-legal
• Permanently closed
• Private or unauthorized
• Duplicate map data
• Not actually a rideable trail
• A short map artifact or irrelevant connector
• Outside the intended area
• Inappropriate for Unridden tracking for another reason

When in doubt, use your best judgment and favor legality, safety, and respect for land managers.

Ambassadors may rename trails when the imported name is incorrect, missing, outdated, unofficial, or inconsistent with local usage.

Where possible, use:

1. Official land manager names
2. Signed trail names
3. Widely accepted local names
4. Clear descriptive names only when no better name exists

Avoid joke names, personal names, temporary names, or names that only one riding group uses unless they are truly the accepted local standard.

Ambassadors may add, edit, or verify trail difficulty ratings.

Difficulty ratings should reflect the trail itself, not how hard it felt on your worst day, after work, in the rain, with a creaky bottom bracket, while under-fueled.

When rating trails, consider:

• Technical difficulty
• Sustained steepness
• Exposure
• Consequences of mistakes
• Obstacles and features
• Typical local conditions
• How the trail compares to other trails in the same area

Try to be consistent within the area. A "blue" should mean roughly the same thing across nearby trails, even if ratings differ from another region.

Ambassadors help maintain closure status when they become aware of closures or reopenings.

Closure information may come from land managers, trail organizations, official websites, posted signs, direct observation, or user reports.

If a trail is closed, mark it closed. When it reopens, update it.

Unridden may also allow users to report closures. Ambassadors may be asked to review those reports and update trail status where appropriate.

Closure tracking is best effort, but it matters. Unridden should not encourage or reward riding closed trails.

Ambassadors must not knowingly enable, promote, approve, or give credit for trails that are illegal, closed, private, restricted, or unauthorized.

When there is uncertainty, consider:

• Land manager rules
• Official maps
• Trail organization guidance
• Posted signs
• Seasonal restrictions
• Local access sensitivities
• Whether publicizing a trail could create problems

If a trail is sensitive, disputed, or questionable, be conservative.

The goal is to support trail access, not accidentally nuke it from orbit.

Ambassadors may receive reports or suggestions from other users.

Treat reports in good faith, but verify when possible. Users may be mistaken, GPS may be weird, and trail names may vary by group.

Good Ambassador practice:

• Review reports fairly
• Look for corroborating information
• Avoid personal disputes
• Prefer official sources when available
• Escalate uncertain issues to Unridden when needed
• Be willing to correct mistakes

Ambassadors are expected to act respectfully and responsibly.

Please do

• Be fair
• Be accurate
• Respect land managers and trail organizations
• Respect other users
• Keep local politics and personal grudges out of trail decisions
• Use ambassador tools only for their intended purpose
• Ask for help when unsure

Please do not

• Manipulate trail data for personal leaderboard advantage
• Approve trails you know are illegal or closed
• Rename trails as jokes
• Change ratings to win arguments
• Use ambassador access to harass or target users
• Treat the role as ownership of an area

You are helping maintain a shared resource. The badge is cool, but the trust matters more.

Ambassadors are volunteers. Ambassador status does not create employment, contractor, partnership, or agency relationship with Unridden or Cobalt Edge LLC.

Unridden may provide badges, recognition, swag, merchandise, event opportunities, or other perks when available, but these are not guaranteed compensation.

Unridden may change or remove Ambassador access at any time if needed.

Contact Unridden when:

• A trail legality issue is unclear
• A user report involves a sensitive access issue
• A trail system needs major cleanup
• A boundary or sub-area seems wrong
• There is disagreement among local users
• You suspect cheating or abuse
• You are not sure how to classify a trail
• You want to suggest better tools or workflows

Ambassadors are the local experts. Unridden provides the tools. Together, we keep the map useful, the challenges fair, and the trail karma intact.