home to the largest parks, because the land was set aside before suburban sprawl reached out to the northern parts of the County. Little Bennett Regional Park covers 3700 acres and offers 27 miles of trails, and Black Hill Regional Park, with 2000 acres surrounding Little Seneca Lake reservoir, has 22 miles of trails. Most are natural surface trails, designed to be sustainable and prevent soil erosion, but many County park trails are paved to make them accessible for people with mobility challenges. For example, the entire 6.6 mile trail system at South Germantown Park / Soccerplex is accessible.
Bob Turnbull, Natural Surfaces Trails Program Manager with Montgomery County Parks, who manages the County’ s extensive parks trails network, has been at the Parks department for more than 25 years. To talk with Bob is to hear the evolution of the County’ s vision from 11 parks with about 90 miles of trails when he started, to its huge success today. The County has gradually increased its investment in parks and trails, realizing they generate high satisfaction and value to taxpayers for relatively low expense. A major visioning project five years in the making engaged various stakeholders, and resulted in the 2016 Countywide Trails Plan. The Plan established a longterm goal of creating four regional loops to eventually connect the county from east to west and north to south utilizing both paved and natural surface trails. This plan would incorporate existing greenways and State park land, in addition to County parks. Turnbull says,“ The idea is to cover the entire county well, for hikers and runners, for adventure seekers or bike commuters. We want to connect park and recreation areas to commercial areas, so that everyone’ s needs are met.” The 2016 Plan process included a survey that indicated that 68 % of County residents use parks trails, and 73 % reported that trails are important to their family. Data also showed that 99 % of the County population lives within three miles of a major trail link.
When Bob first started working on natural surface trails, he was solo; he now heads a team of nine full-time and six part-time staff, including three construction crews and a Volunteer Manager. A critical program the Parks Department created is the Montgomery Parks Trail Ambassador Program. With Todd Bauer, Montgomery Parks Trail Volunteer Manager, they leverage almost 5000 volunteer hours per year to serve the system.“ We get the community involved, and they take ownership,” Turnbull says.“ We have episodic volunteer work days, then we identify people who really want to help. We make them a‘ Trail Ranger,’ assigned to a section of trail. Then if they keep up with the work, we make them a‘ Trail Crew Leader,’ and with some safety and sustainability training, they oversee quarterly trail cleanup days on their section of trail.” Turnbull says without this level of community support it would be impossible to keep up with the County’ s extensive trail system. Always trying to expand the volunteer base, Bauer recruits volunteers for corporate retreat activities and
Student Service Learning( SSL) hours, as well.
Another program that County residents can be proud of is the Montgomery Parks Trail Investor Program created by Turnbull. This program recruits young people from urban areas to volunteer on trail crews so they get to know and appreciate the system, then provides donated all-terrain bikes so they can ride the trails. Turnbull says,“… so we’ re teaching the kids to value the trails, because they help maintain them, and to share their enthusiasm with their parents.”
The newest jewel in the crown will be the Royce Hanson Conservation Park, almost 400 acres recently acquired by the County, deep in the northwest corner of the Ag Reserve. It will have five miles of trails in four loops, with picnic areas, and interpretive historic areas that highlight the ruins of old farm buildings.( See related article on page 4). Turnbull saved many tons of red Seneca Stone from a development project
Bob Turnbull of Montgomery Parks with recovered haul of Seneca stone.
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