THE ROAD BACK TO RENSHAW
AFTER TWO SEASONS WITHOUT ACCESS, ONE OF BC’S BEST-KNOWN SNOWMOBILE RIDING AREAS IS BACK. GETTING THERE TOOK A COMMUNITY.
There’s big country, and then there’s Renshaw.
Just outside McBride, the largest managed snowmobile riding area in British Columbia stretches across a sprawling mix of alpine bowls, meadows, creeks, tree riding and terrain that runs from approachable to decidedly not. It’s the kind of place where packing spare fuel isn’t over-preparing. It’s good advice.
For decades, Renshaw has been McBride’s flagship riding area and one of the reasons snowmobilers make the winter drive into the Robson Valley.
LOSING ACCESS TO RENSHAW
In January 2025, the Province decided the bridge into Renshaw no longer met engineering and environmental standards and closed the bridge, effectively putting Renshaw out of reach.
Without the crossing, the McBride Big Country Snowmobile Association couldn’t groom the access trail or provide the managed winter access riders relied on. For McBride, the impact travelled well beyond the trailhead. In a community of roughly 600 people, snowmobilers are an important part of winter, filling rooms, restaurants and fuel tanks along the way. The closure meant losing access to one of the riding areas that draws visitors here in the first place.
Getting Renshaw back, however, wasn’t going to be as simple as repairing the old bridge.
BUILDING THE WAY BACK
The solution is a new 140-foot free-span bridge, engineered to meet modern standards, carry the club’s snowcat groomer and restore reliable winter access into Renshaw. Installation alone is expected to cost approximately $500,000, on top of hundreds of thousands of dollars in donated bridge materials.
For a volunteer snowmobile club in a community the size of McBride, getting a project of that scale off the ground has taken a much bigger team.
The McBride Big Country Snowmobile Association has partnered with local businesses, the Village of McBride, Recreation Sites and Trails BC and Trans Mountain, which helped accelerate the engineering and planning needed to move the replacement forward. Funding through the Province of BC’s Rural Economic Diversification and Infrastructure Program has helped turn those plans into a path back to Renshaw.
It’s a significant investment in a bridge. But on the other side of it sits one of BC’s largest managed snowmobile riding areas, winter visitation for a small Robson Valley community, and access riders have been missing for two seasons.
“Sometimes you have to be knocked down before you can rebuild something better.”
— Rick Shafer, McBride Big Country Snowmobile Association
RENSHAW RETURNS
Construction is scheduled to begin in September 2026, with the goal of having the new bridge in place and access restored for the 2026/27 riding season.
If everything goes to plan, riders will be pointing their skis toward Renshaw again this winter, with one of BC’s biggest managed riding areas back within reach. And with two winters to make up for, you might want to give yourself another day.
READY TO RIDE MCBRIDE?
Renshaw is only one of four managed riding areas around McBride. Explore the riding, check the trail conditions and start planning a few days in the Robson Valley.
