Pullman Trail opens, connects downtown to Northwoods Trails
The first direct trail connection between downtown Hot Springs and the Northwoods Trails system opened to the public on Wednesday.
Pullman Trail, a nearly 1-mile trail segment that includes a .65mile section of Hot Springs National Park, is open to hikers and mountain bikers.
It is the only area in Hot Springs National Park where mountain biking is allowed; only around 10% of the properties managed systemwide by the National Park Service allow mountain biking, a trail official said.
“It’s really big, especially for the Park Avenue community and downtown,” Northwoods Trails Coordinator Traci Berry said.
“Having trails that are worldclass trails bring a lot of people in from out of town,” Berry said. “It’s really important that we have that neighborhood connection because a big selling point is that you can ride from your hotel room or the front door of your Airbnb to the trails, but I think even more important than the impact it’s having by way of tourism and having its selling point is the accessibility it gives to the community of people who work here and live here in Hot Springs.”
She noted the Northwoods Trails system has received more recreational usage since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, so the opening of the trail is quite timely.
“We’re seeing a lot of traffic from both in-town and out-of-town riders, but we’re also seeing a lot of beginner, or novice, riders starting to ride out on the trails,” Berry said.
To access the trailhead from downtown, parking is available at the end of Pullman Avenue.
With the trail now being open and mixed with part national park land and part city of Hot Springs land, Berry said there will need to be “a lot of education” to the trail’s users.
“There is an old homestead that is located on this trail right before Sunset, so anything within national park boundaries that’s over 50 years old is considered historical, so because of that, what might look like trash to someone, like an old rusted tricycle, or like the old car that’s there, because of that these things can’t be removed,” she said. “So it might look like trash; like old glass bottles from the 1950s, (but it) is part of the historic site, so these articles can’t be removed.”
“So there’s certain things within the national park boundaries,” she said, “that we have to have certain rules that we have to abide by or follow, that aren’t necessarily the same on our property. Like, on national park property, or on their portion of the trail, if you have your dogs on that trail they have to be on leash. Things that might look like trash on that trail aren’t actually trash and need to be left alone.”
Pullman Trail passes near a historic homesite, according to a news release from the National Park Service. “Objects that may appear to be trash, such as bottles, tin cans, toys, and even a car, are archaeological artifacts. They are protected by federal law and should be left in place. Mountain bikes are allowed only on Pullman Trail. Other trails within Hot Springs National Park, including Sunset Trail which crosses Pullman Trail, are closed to mountain bikes. Horses are not allowed on Pullman Trail.”
“(This is) the only trail in Hot Springs National Park property that they will be allowing mountain bikes on,” Berry said. “But there are … over 400 properties that are managed by the NPS in the U.S., but there’s only a little over 40 of those properties that allow mountain biking within their property boundaries. So us becoming one of those 40-plus is a pretty big deal.”
A grant from the Walton Family Foundation at the recommendation of Steuart Walton and Tom Walton supported development of the trail, the release said. The trail was constructed by the International Mountain Bicycling Association’s Trail Solutions crew, who also built Phase 1 of the Northwoods Trails and improved trails in Cedar Glades Park.
“We are happy to work together with our partners in providing mountain bike access in the park that connects to the world-class mountain bike trails at Northwoods,” HSNP Superintendent Laura Miller said in the release.
City Manager Bill Burrough said in the release the city is “very excited about the opening of the Pullman Trailhead and the neighborhood connection this will provide our residents and visitors. We greatly value our partnership with the National Park Service and Visit Hot Springs, who have been instrumental in the development of this trailhead.”