Beers retires after blazing trail
When Andy Beers retired last week, he closed the book on a hectic five years of work. After decades serving the outdoors through roles at a nonprofit and then the state, Beers spent the last few years as director of the Empire State Trail project, guiding the initiative through the process of adding 350 miles of trail across the state in a very short period of time.
Beers became director of the Empire State Trail program in 2017, shortly after then-gov. Andrew M. Cuomo announced the initiative to create a 750-mile trail system (400 miles of which already existed) spanning the state, from Buffalo to Albany, Albany south to New York City and Albany north to Canada.
Closing gaps between existing sections of trail and planning new on-road routes involved $200 million dollars in state funding, and 58 construction projects by nine state agencies and authorities as well as 17 municipalities. In all, the Empire State Trail added 180 miles of new off-road trail.
Beers called the effort’s planning, environmental review, permitting, engineering, design, procurement and construction a “five-year sprint.”
“There wasn’t a day we weren’t working hard for five years to get all this stuff done,” he said. “My job was primarily leading the orchestra…. A lot of my work was just coordinating and helping people problem solve and get through planning.”
Even before he became director of the project, Beers had cycled the length of the Erie Canalway Trail, which stretches about 400 miles from Buffalo to Albany, when he rode with the annual Cycle the Erie Canal bike tour sponsored by Parks and Trails New York. After being appointed director of the trail project, he rode the Cycle the Erie Canal ride again, and then rode or walked the remaining miles of the proposed Empire State Trail route, either on the route itself or on parallel roads.
“It’s been a fun job to be out in the field,” Beers said. “At this point, there isn’t a section of trail I haven’t ridden multiple times.”
Beers doesn’t have a favorite section, saying each off-road segment has its own character.
“It really highlights the diversity of New York, so it’s basically all great,” he said. “I say my favorite section is the one I’m going to be riding.”
Beers lives just a few miles from the Albany-hudson Electric Trail, a new section of the Empire State Trail that runs for 36 miles from the city of Rensselaer to the city of Hudson.
“For decades, I was aware of this old trolley line. I thought ‘Wouldn’t that be a fun trail someday’ and then all of this came together,” Beers said. “It’s very satisfying personally to be a part of a job that is so local.”
Beers started his career as a legislative assistant after leaving graduate school. He soon moved to The Nature Conservancy, where he stayed for 17 years.
“Being able to go up to Little Tupper Lake with friends and canoe on the Whitney canoe area up there and know that I played my small part in that and some of the other major land acquisitions that I was involved in, were highlights of that part of the career,” he said.
He later moved to the New York State Office of Parks, Recreation & Historic Preservation, where he served as executive deputy commissioner, the No. 2 role in the agency. During his 10 years there, he helped lay the groundwork for a major reinvestment in the state parks system.
His role with the Empire State Trail was more hands-on than his previous jobs. Though he spent many hours coordinating with agencies and municipalities, he also personally answered some email inquiries about the trail, and would sometimes stop while driving to put up Empire State Trail signs. He was simultaneously the director for the Hudson River Valley Greenway, and worked as the project manager for the organization’s construction of the Albany-hudson Electric Trail.
Beers said his recent retirement doesn’t mean his career is over. But his new touring bike arrived a few weeks ago.
“I’m very excited about that,” he said, laughing. “I’m planning on doing more bike rides this year. I’m going to stay involved in the local Albany-hudson Electric Trail on a very part-time basis. I’m going to go outside and ski and hike and canoe and look at birds and everything else. I don’t think I’m done working, but I’m taking a year off to really think about what I want to do next.”