USFS National Forest System Trails · Gila National Forest · New Mexico · Updated June 2026
Gold Dust (USFS trail 41) is a 2.2 mi trail in Gila National Forest, New Mexico. Mountain bikes are designated as allowed year-round, with no Class 1 e-bike designation on record.
Can I bike Gold Dust?
| Use | Status | Season on record |
|---|---|---|
| Mountain bike | Allowed | year-round |
| Class 1 e-bike (pedal-assist, 20 mph) | Restricted | — |
| Class 2 e-bike (throttle, 20 mph) | Restricted | — |
| Class 3 e-bike (pedal-assist, 28 mph) | Restricted | — |
Zooming out: across Gila National Forest, 88% of rideable trail miles are open to mountain bikes — a Bike Access Grade of A.
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About this trail
In Gila National Forest, New Mexico, Gold Dust (USFS trail 41) covers 2.2 mi of National Forest System trail. Everything below comes straight from the US Forest Service National Forest System Trails dataset — length, surface, slope-derived difficulty, and the specific bike and e-bike designations on record — so you can check legality before you load up. Underfoot, the trail is recorded as native material. No grade band is recorded, so a steepness-based difficulty isn't available for this trail. Mountain bikes are allowed, open year-round in the data. The agency lists no Class 1, 2 or 3 e-bike designation here; absent a local order to the contrary, that means e-bikes are not an allowed use on this trail. The route is mapped as USFS Trail Class 3 on the agency's 1-to-5 development scale, where 1 is the most primitive, minimally maintained tread and 5 is the most developed. Treat this as a planning reference rather than a live conditions report, and verify any time-sensitive closure or order with the ranger district that manages Gila National Forest.
Frequently asked questions
- Can you mountain bike on Gold Dust?
- Yes. Mountain bikes are designated as allowed on Gold Dust in Gila National Forest, year-round, per USFS data.
- Are e-bikes allowed on Gold Dust?
- No e-bike class (1, 2 or 3) is designated on Gold Dust in the USFS data.
- How long is Gold Dust?
- Gold Dust measures about 2.2 mi in total, summed across its mapped National Forest System segments.
- What is the surface of Gold Dust?
- USFS data records the tread surface of Gold Dust as native material.
How we read this data
Grade-based difficulty above is the USFS grade (route steepness), not a technical mountain-bike rating — a gentle-grade trail can still be rocky or technical, and vice versa. Bike and e-bike status come verbatim from the USFS managed-use fields for this trail; we never infer access we can't cite. See our methodology for how the dataset is built and what each field means.
Where it is
Approximate location of Gila National Forest (USFS trail geometry isn't mapped).
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