Kent Eriksen stretched his arms above a chain-link fence to capture the moment with his cellphone as an excavator pulls down what remains of the building where the mountain-bike pioneer created the first Moots Cycles.

“I don’t really have any,” Eriksen responded when asked about the emotions he was feeling as the buildings and trees on the property at the corner of Yampa and 12^th were removed Tuesday evening and Wednesday. “I’m all for the next generation and totally understand. Collin (Kelley) has some energy — I’ve been there and done that.”

Kelley plans to construct a new mixed-use development on the site that will include eight condominiums, a restaurant and a parking structure. The Steamboat Springs City Council has remanded Kelley’s proposal back to the city Planning Commission for modifications.

Over the past few weeks, Eriksen has selected items he wanted to save from the building, including the hobbit-shaped door that led from Sore Saddle Cyclery to the shop where he crafted bikes, as well as the very top of the iconic cone-shaped building — which was hinged so that it could be opened by a hydraulic system.

Local historian Bill Fletcher provided articles from the Steamboat Pilot that noted the cone was a wood-waste incinerator that had been part of the Mill Creek Sawmill, which harvested timber on the flanks of Sand Mountain and Meaden Peak starting in 1956. The mill and burner eventually were moved to the Fairview area in 1962.

The mill pulled out of Fairview in summer 1971, leaving the burner behind. The burner became the property of the city of Steamboat Springs and was sold, in 1978, to Eriksen for $1. Eriksen, however, noted that the cone ended up costing him $2 because he took too long to get it moved.

The cones ended up at Yampa and 12^th streets after Eriksen and his partners purchased a dairy distribution center. The new location would become the center of the Steamboat Springs bicycling world. Eriksen moved Sore Saddle Cyclery, which opened in 1975, into the cone, and used a tin building left from the distribution center to build his bikes.

“There are so many people in the bike world, that are spread all over the world, that met in this place in the mid-1990s,” longtime local Jon Cariveau said of meeting his wife. “That’s where Sally and I met … I was a mechanic at Sore Saddle, and there used to be a picnic bench out under that tree. That’s how we met, sitting there having lunch.”

Sore Saddle went through a couple of owners before the space became home to Orange Peel Bicycle Services and, most recently, Love Yoga. Kelley, the developer of the new project proposed for the property, said he offered Eriksen and other former owners an opportunity to take what they wanted prior to the demolition. He added that the carved tree trunk on the deck of the former Double Z restaurant is being taken by a former business owner who operated at that location.

The tin building was replaced with a two-story office building where Moots, which started with steel frames, grew into a force in the mountain biking world — starting in 1983, when Steve Tilford jumped on the back of one of Eriksen’s bikes and won the first National Off Road Bicycle Association Nationals.

“Moots made the bike that won the very first national championship in 1983, and that put us on the map,” Eriksen said.

Eriksen spent a large part of Wednesday watching the buildings come down at the corner of Yampa and 12^th streets. “I’m emotion-free,” he said. “I don’t hold on and it’s time to move on.”