Winnakee Land Trust seeks backing for trails

RHINEBECK, N.Y. » The Winnakee Land Trust is seeking the town’s endorsement of a plan to create a trail through the Rhinebeck Cemetery, from U.S. Route 9 to Thompson-Mazzarella Park.

Land trust Executive Director Gregg Swanzey said this week that the planned Rhinebeck trail is one of three the group wants to create in Northern Dutchess.

“We’re looking at whether we can do trail projects in Rhinebeck, Red Hook and Hyde Park,” he said.

The trust is asking the town boards in the Rhinebeck, Red Hook and Hyde Park to support a Consolidated Funding application for the trails money. The application is to be submitted to the state Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation next month, Swanzey said.

The Rhinebeck trail would be about 0.3 miles long and cost $130,000, Swanzey said.

The Red Hook the trail would run about 2 miles from state Route 199 to state Route 9G, near Bard College, and cost about $1.2 million, he said, while the Hyde Park trail would be a half-mile long from U.S. Route 9 to Val-Kill, the Eleanor Roosevelt National Historic Site, and cost about $130,000.

“In Hyde Park, we’re looking to connect near the FDR site to Val-Kill, and that’s what we’re trying to do in each of these trails — make connections where there are none now,” Swanzey said.

Rhinebeck Cemetery Committee Chairwoman Suzanne Kelly supports the Rhinebeck trial proposal, saying it would give residents an opportunity to use a section of the park that already is planned to have trails.

“It’s 40 acres of open space that the town owns that people could access if they had a connection,” she said.