Long road to completion
Kaaterskill Rail Trail offers hiking opportunity
HAINES FALLS — It’s a project that was decades in the making.
And on Saturday, June 1, the Kaaterskill Rail Trail in Haines Falls finally had its grand opening celebration.
The one-and-a-half mile recreational trail runs along the abandoned Ulster & Delaware Railroad bed between the Mountain Top Historical Society and the end of Laurel House Road. In the future the trail could connect to the Escarpment Trail by the state Department of Environmental Conservation’s North-South Lake campground.
The idea to turn the abandoned railroad bed into a recreational trail dates back to the 1970s, but the plan did not come to fruition until a group of organizations and volunteers became focused on making it a reality.
“It’s not a new idea,” said Michelle Yost, watershed assistance program coordinator for the Greene County Soil & Water Conservation Dis- trict. “It’s just never had its time to come full circle like it has now.”
Yost said she does not know what the holdup was in getting the trail created when it was first envisioned in the 1970s. She said her guess was there was never an organized approach to the project.
In 2000, the town of Hunter did apply for a transportation enhancement grant to create the trail, but it was never approved, Yost said. She said the plan ultimately went dor-
mant again.
Then in 2007 the Greene County Soil & Water Conservation District began its Mountaintop Community Resource Strategy, Yost said. She said that was started through a state Department of State grant, which allowed the district to work across the entire mountaintop with communities, businesses and non-profit organizations to look at ways to improve the area’s outdoor and cultural resources. They also looked at projects that were fitting for watershed protection, Yost said.
As a result of that project, which lasted about two years, an Outdoor Resources Committee was formed, Yost said. She said that group revisited the idea of creating the rail trail as well as another project called the Windham Path. The group later broke into two subsets, one for the Kaaterskill Rail Trail and one for the Windham Path, Yost said.
Yost said the committee that worked on the Kaaterskill Rail Trail included representatives from the state Department of Environmental Conservation, the New York-New Jersey Trail Conference, the town, the Mountain Top Historical Society and the county Soil & Water Conservation District. She said many people donated their time, materials, labor and expertise to make the project a reality.
“It’s really, really exciting to work with such dedicated people who have had this vision for such a long time,” Yost said.
The railroad where the Kaaterskill Rail Trail now runs was in service from the 1880s to the 1940s, serving Haines Falls and the mountain top where there were a number of hotels including the Catskill Mountain House and Hotel Kaaterskill, according to Robert Gildersleeve, a member of the Mountain Top Historical Society and author of “Catskill Mountain House Trail Guide: In the Footsteps of the Hudson River School.” He said there were actually two separate rail lines owned by competing companies at the time, but the tracks were pulled up in the 1940s after they were no longer in use.
Gildersleeve said the trail was later informally used by local property owners and others, but it had gotten overgrown quite a bit. Volunteers had to go in and cut down the small trees and dig up stumps to make the trail navigable again, he said.
Yost said the trail will be open year-round for non-motorized use and there will be kiosks at each of the trailheads that feature maps. The trail itself is well-marked and easy to traverse, she said. Yost added that at one point the trail runs along a small stretch of North Lake Road to skirt one property whose owner has not signed on to the trail plan. She said other property owners have given their permission for the trail to run across their land.
“People shouldn’t have any trouble finding the trail,” Yost said. She added that there are plans to have the Kaaterskill Rail Trail connect to the Escarpment Trail via a pedestrian bridge over the Spruce Creek, but that is for the future. She said there are also plans to extend the trail into the village.
There are places along the rail trail where visitors can get glimpses of the Kaaterskill Falls, Gildersleeve added. He said there is also the potential to open up some of those views in the future, but that is not a priority right now.
Gildersleeve added that the trail began as a footpath before being taken over by the rail lines and has now come full circle.
Yost said the trail will “be nice for families” and casual hikers. She also said there is work being done to smooth out the surface of the trail in some areas.
There are also plans to add more interpretive panels on the trail that will speak more to the economy back in the 1800s and the role of the railroad in bringing people to the area for vacation, Yost said. She added that old railroad ties and cinders can still be seen along the trail.
“So people will have a sense of history before they go out on the trail,” Yost said.
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