I came across a video the other day that I felt more people needed to see. It covers a marvel of human engineering that I think many skilled architects or interior designers would be hard-pressed to top. No, I’m not talking about a sexy(?) new building, I’m talking about Ray’s Indoor Mountain Bike Park (Ray’s) in Cleveland, OH.
Why Am I Geeking Out Over This?
I have always been a fan of interior “fun parks” because of their super-efficient use of space and the creativity that goes into laying them out. Ray’s is a mountain bike park, but I love indoor climbing arenas, mini-gold spots, roller coasters, paintball battlegrounds — you name it, I dig it and I’ve tried it at one point or another if I’ve been fortunate enough to come across it.
Opened in 2004 — Ray’s is MASSIVE! I figured the place has to be looking at the video above. To get some sense of scale, I checked out their address on Google Maps.
I identified some other objects just so that you can get a sense of scale in the image…
- Ray’s is large enough to house a few baseball fields with room to spare
- Ray’s could probably fit over 30 houses in their square footage PLUS their yards
- Ray’s could probably store well over 550+ cars with room for them to maneuver
- Ray’s could act as a growing space for 20-25 large trees
THIS. PLACE. IS. HUGE.
And it’s going to keep growing. They have a tagline on their site that says, “IF YOU KEEP COMING, WE WILL KEEP BUILDING!” And I think they mean it based on what I could find out there. A search for “Ray’s indoor mountain bike park square footage” yielded a number of interesting results…
- They opened at 66,000 sq ft in 2004 (according to a 2017 Cleveland 19 News story)
- Wikipedia lists them at an outdated 92,000 sq ft
- The number 1 Google search result from The Beacon Journal has them listed at 150,000 sq ft
- That same Cleveland 19 News post mentioned above listed them at 165,000 sq ft in 2017
- And an April 2019 YouTube video claimed Ray’s was 180,000 sq ft
What I’m saying is that this place continues to gain footage in that old factory location they’re at, and apparently truly embodies that old, “If you build it they will come,” phrase from Field of Dreams.
And look at what they’ve done with the layout!
Ray’s Bike Park is Probably Too Good For Me
Haha – like many things in life, I’m probably not good enough on a bike to ride around Ray’s hallowed floors, but (also like many things out of my league) – I want to TRY!!
I haven’t gone off-road biking in Lord knows how long, so it would probably be very entertaining to watch me struggle in Ray’s for a bit. I have no concerns about riding in general, but “riding a bike” vs. what they’re doing in the video above are two very different things to me – LOL
I genuinely just wanted to share this one because it made me happy to see and it’s been added to the bucket list to try sometime soon. I feel like when you see little gems like this – you just have to spread the news.
Ray’s Indoor Mountain Bike Park and the city of Cleveland, OH – expect a visit from ya’ boy sometime in the near future.
Peace, and thanks for reading.
The soundtrack for this post provided by…
Image Credits:
– Cover Image © Unknown
– Body Image 1 © Johnnie Weathersby III
– Body Image 2 © RAY’SMTB