By: Lydia Crawley
The Parsons Advocate
Executive Director for WV TRAILS Sam England hosted a forum at Blackwater Lodge in Blackwater Falls State Park November 4th to discuss the state of trails across West Virginia, as well as to seek input from the community about various issues surrounding trails and trail networks in the area and beyond.
The meeting was the eighth in a series that West Virginia Trails has been hosting across the State in an effort to gain information from the public, as well as to inform the trail community of efforts across the State.
“One of the reasons we are having this meeting at 6 o’clock at night,” England said. “We wanted to do it in the evening because people who support trails have another job or if they are like me and retired, they just use it whenever they want. But everybody else has something else that they are doing and trails is their passion.”
England provided information at the meeting about the work that is being done towards a state-wide trail network. Efforts by the group included working with Legislators and gathering information from the public in meetings such as the one held in Tucker County.
Among those who spoke at the event was Brian Sarfino of the Heart of the Highlands and the Tucker County Convention and Visitors Bureau.
Sarfino spoke about the Heart of the Highlands trail system and the system’s recent accomplishments and goals including the Chris Clower Trail, 3.5 miles of “social” trail at Dobbin House in Blackwater Falls State Park in conjunction with the USFS and the Headwaters Trail from Canaan Valley National Wildlife Refuge Visitors Center to Allegheny Trail in Canaan Valley State Park. Other goals for the group discussed included the Big Cove Trail project as a matching partner with the Nature Conservancy and a trail between Davis and Thomas.
“Davis, West Virginia is unique to the State,” Sarfino said, “in the fact that you can reside in the town, stay in the town and leave from the town and access three different trail zones all within five minutes.”
WV TRAIL gathered the opinions of those attendees through the use of a phone application. A series of questions were asked throughout the evening, to which attendees would submit their answers through the app. Answers would be anonymously displayed on the screen at the front of the room for discussion during the session in an interactive manner.
“I own a million acres right outside my front door that I don’t have to maintain,” Sarfino said. “I pay tax on it, like everybody else in this room does, but its an incredible opportunity that I feel has been under exploited by the State and the towns and everybody else.”
Representatives from trail organizations in Elkins and neighboring communities were also present at the meeting. They voiced frustration that rail trails were not the same as single track trails and needed to be handled differently.
In all 28 attendees gathered to learn and be heard regarding trails in Tucker County and the surrounding area.
WV TRAIL said they are West Virginia’s only statewide organization focused on promoting, expanding and maintaining non-motorized trails. WV TRAIL also said they are not a trail building organization, rather they work to unite and mobilize the trail community, the organization says, through advocacy and information sharing.
