Recommended trail building websites or books?

I poked through the links here:

http://nsmba.ca/trail-building-tips

Unfortunately a lot of the links are dead. Can anybody recommend so good reasources I can read through, online or otherwise?

http://www.imba.com/catalog/book-trail-solutions

^ The NSMBA Builders Academy course uses parts of the IMBA book as a resource. The book is a good guideline for the fundamentals of building, but some techniques vary based on local conditions.

I actually found this book to be a really good resource on trail design.

http://www.natureshape.com/pubs/nstbd.html

It explained a lot about human behavior in relation to physical attributes of the land… how anchors and gateways instinctively attract people to certain places and make a trail enjoyable. Basically if you don't incorporate these into your trail, the user will move your trail so that it does.

A lot of what I thought was gut instinct on how I thought things should be built was articulated in that book.

Ok, here is an excerpt from their description:

The Foundation Level
The Foundation Level distills the complexity of human and physical forces and relationships into eleven relatively simple, interrelated, interacting concepts. The eleven concepts are grouped into five categories:
1.
Human Perception: The shape of nature itself, and how we perceive nature, trails, and sites (two concepts)
2.
Human Feelings: How trails make us feel and how that affects trail visitors’ choices and behavior (four concepts)
3.
Physical Forces: How compaction, displacement, and erosion act and interact on natural surface trails (three concepts)
4.
Tread (trail surface) Materials: Characteristics of soil types, rock, and crushed stone and how they perform under trail use and erosion (one concept)
5.
Tread Watersheds: The complex interaction of slopes, grades, water sources, runoff, physical forces, tread materials, water movement, and tread drainage presented in a structured, easy-to-understand way (one concept with 12 factors)
In short, Natural Surface Trails by Design describes the basic physical and human forces and relationships acting on each and every natural surface trail. How it does this is both innovative and potent. Instead of rules which work only in limited circumstances, its eleven distilled concepts form a flexible system of thought that works in any instance. The system explains the “whys” of trails in both human and physical terms, crystalizing the basic forces, relationships, and interactions of natural surface trails in a manageable, logical system of causes and consequences.

By understanding the eleven concepts and how they interact, you can think like a skilled trail designer. See and use the same information that skilled designers do, “read” existing trails, predict what will occur in the near and long term, predict how visitors will likely behave, anticipate and accommodate future changes caused by trail use and erosion, tightly weave trails into their sites, use natural features to improve both sustainability and visitor enjoyment, relate dozens of aspects of trails that previously seemed separate or weren’t even apparent to you, and more.

What I like to do is if I am riding and a particular trail or feature make me feel good.
I stop and look it over carefully and see what the builder did to make this memorable.
ex. there is a small windy section on Sumas EmmaPeel just before the road .
Where you go back in again on a small bridge.(bridge was put there to discourage horses)
This section the first time I rode it felt right. The type of windage is what I have used and reused for years.
I call it the wavy gravy,add in some grade reversals and your smiling.
Full bench cut it and open her up and bob's your uncle.
g

Thanks for the tips guys.

The imba guys are doing a school in Abbotsford this weekend that I'm going to.