The Team
Brian Vaughan
Brian Vaughan, Owner/Operator,
Brian got his start in trail building with the Student Conservation Association as a Crew Leader. From there in 2009 he founded Ptarmigan Ptrails based in Alaska. As the founder Brian lead crews on a variety of different trail projects in the South-Central region of Alaska. In 2014, he sold the company and moved to Hailey, ID where he founded Titus Trails LLC (formerly known as Red Elephant Trails). Since founding this company Brian has constructed trails primarily in the mountain west, including almost all of the major projects in the Wood River Valley, which has been in the process of rebuilding their trail system after the Beaver Creek fire. Such projects include rebuilding the Alden Gulch trail in the Ketchum Ranger District and the Croy Creek Trail system that is located on BLM land just outside of Hailey.
Jess Simon
Jess started building trails in 2018 with the rebuilding of the Alden Gulch trail. Operating mini excavators and hand finishing the fire ravished trail sparked his interested and he has been building since. In 2019 he traveled to Austria in partnership with Allegra Trourismus (a Swiss and Austrian based trail building company) to further his learning in different techniques of building in the European Alps. In the winters he resides in Sun Valley where he is a backcountry ski guide and avalanche educator. This furthers his understanding of navigating mountainous terrain, route finding on the fly, and shooting grade/slope angle to keep his clients energy high for the downhill and avoid avalanches. He likes to toe the line between young professional, cheap living and extensive recreating. Spending the summer months living in a truck camper allows for the nimbleness required to build trail where ever the job my require - some may call this being a “dirtbag”, but that doesn’t bother him.