Who keeps the Bendix Woods bike trails: NIMBA and the county, in succession

item 5 — organizational succession for the Bendix Woods mountain-bike system, dated as far as the published record dates it

The Bendix Woods mountain-bike system has two holders, and the record names both plainly: the ground is St. Joseph County Parks ground, and the trails on it are, in the county's own park literature, "specially designed mountain bike trails managed by NIMBA, the Northern Indiana Mountain Bike Association." NIMBA's own published record describes what it is: a not-for-profit, all-volunteer group that works to help riders find trails, promote responsible trail use, maintain existing trails, and assist local park departments in new trail development, funded by annual membership fees, direct donations and fundraising events including its 16 Trail Challenge and its annual races. Its scale, in its own 2023 volunteer accounting, is six trails and 45 miles of trails across its Michiana ground, kept by thousands of volunteer hours a year, with a trail steward being set up for each of its six trails; the same accounting names Jeff Pedler as president and Jason Hanks as trail-maintenance and volunteer coordinator. NIMBA is a chapter of the International Mountain Bicycling Association — the form its Andrews University signage gift was announced under, with John Marquardt named as its president in that account — and it stands in IMBA's own chapter lists. The dated stewardship the record reaches is concrete one park over: the Friends of Potato Creek State Park's Fall 2026 newsletter records that NIMBA originally built that park's seven miles of mountain-bike trails and continues to maintain them, and has volunteered at Potato Creek for 19 years — carrying the association's documented trail-building course back to about 2007. At Bendix Woods the county's own plan dates the work the association now keeps: the six-mile mountain-bike trail was completed in 2013 (see the mileage ledger in this cluster). What the published record reached does not carry is NIMBA's own founding date, any predecessor club, or any merger: no founding account stands on the association's own site as read, and no predecessor or merger is named in the county's plans. The succession therefore prints in two parts — the county-to-NIMBA stewardship, documented and current as of November 2026, and the association's origin, a named gap whose settler is the association's own corporate and early record.

Sources:

1. St. Joseph County Parks, Bendix Woods park brochure / trail map (2026) — "over 5 miles of specially designed mountain bike trails managed by NIMBA, the Northern Indiana Mountain Bike Association."
2. Northern Indiana Mountain Bike Association (nimbamtb.org), Volunteer page — the not-for-profit, all-volunteer definition; the funding lines; the 2023 accounting of six trails, 45 miles, thousands of volunteer hours, per-trail stewards; officers named (Pedler, Hanks).
3. Andrews University, Andrews Agenda, "NIMBA Donates Signage to Andrews Trails" — NIMBA as a chapter of the International Mountain Bike Association; John Marquardt, president, as named there.
4. Friends of Potato Creek State Park, Fall 2026 Newsletter — NIMBA built Potato Creek's seven miles of mountain-bike trails, still maintains them, and has volunteered at the park for 19 years.
5. St. Joseph County Parks, Five Year Master Plan 2014–2018, Bendix Woods page — the six-mile mountain-bike trail completed in 2013.
6. Searches run November 2026 for a NIMBA founding date, predecessor or merger in the association's own publications and the county plans — none reached; printed as the gap above.