Challenge Course Standards and Regulations

Challenge courses have been in an interesting position since their original development in the 60s and 70s.  They have managed to operate without much regulation or oversight for a long time, which is pretty surprising.  They have an inherently physical risk, and serious psychological effects.  These effects can be positive growth or negative damage depending on the situation, but the physical risk is always there.  Much of that risk is due to the heights involved, but most injuries actually take place on low elements.

The growing popularity (and profitability) of zipline canopy tours is rapidly changing the landscape of the challenge course industry.  The focus is shifting from "challenge" and personal growth, to creating "rides" that anyone in the general public can do, with minimal effort.  I seem to be one of the only people actively opposed to that shift, but for at least one obvious reason.  I am not trying to make money in the ropes course business, it is my ministry.  The fact that ziplines generate more potential revenue, naturally leads to the development of more expensive tools to further increase capacity or automation, and therefore profit.  The issue is, that while many of these expensive devices are brilliantly engineered, they don't increase safety as much as they "appear" to, but that won't prevent them from being required by mandate in the near future.  Something that is "automatic" is not necessarily safer than something operated manually, but it does remove some level of potential human error.  On the other hand, potential mechanical failure needs to be accounted for with further costly "backup" systems.

The end result is that I can already see that most of the equipment expenses for the things I build will go up by a factor of ten in the next year or two, and many already have.  It is amusing to see how fast things are changing, in that things I do that were normal a few years ago are now considered archaic.  Most people are stunned that I would be willing to risk my life climbing trees with nothing but staples in them, when there are so many more (expensive) options available.  Ironically much of what I do is to bring older courses up to current standards, but that will become much harder to do as the standards continue to require more expensive changes.

This wouldn't be a forced change if it wasn't for the other result of the growing popularity of canopy tours, government regulation.  I got my first taste of that last summer, with the zipline regulations in Pennsylvania.  Ironically, the most unsafe zipline I had ever seen was there, but the rules say that it has to be certified by an amusement park inspector every month, not that it actually has to be safe.  As more states adopt similar rules, the complexity of satisfying multiple standards organizations, as well as multiple government agencies, will effectively end my ministry in its current form.

So I walk away from a ropes course convention not very excited about building ropes courses, which is not how that is usually supposed to work.  God seems to be giving my ministry favor to continue in the short term, but I find it difficult to imagine how it could continue for more than a year.  But I guess most everything in life is like that, by design.  Things are supposed to be sustained by God, not us.  (But it can still bother me;)