Trail Planning Videos

Erie County and the City of Erie partnered on the development of the City’s first ever active transportation plan, aimed at creating a better environment for people walking and bicycling in Erie. The City used field views and GIS analysis to map the presence of sidewalks on every block. To evaluate the environment for bicycling, the team developed a comprehensive Level of Traffic Stress (LTS) analysis for every street in the City taking into account the effect of street dimensions, speed, parking, and bicycle facilities. This is likely the first citywide application of the LTS approach in Pennsylvania, and it is designed to ensure that all future transportation projects in Erie are designed for people of all ages and abilities. Through a comprehensive public engagement program featuring conventional meetings, an online survey, site visits, a stakeholder committee, and a City-wide mobile workshop on bikes, Erie residents had the opportunity to learn about the project and provide meaningful input. The plan recommends an aspirational yet realistic network of primary bike routes throughout the City, a comprehensive sidewalk installation and repair program, integration of public art, and several policy and program improvements to set Erie up for long-term success.

The Borough of Quakertown has utilized their Main Street designation to develop an evolved revitalization strategy that has identified Nature-Based Placemaking as a key priority. Learn how the community is benefiting when outdoor recreational activities, health, and wellness are incorporated into a strategy. This session will highlight the Nature-Based Placemaking concept, as well as the WalkWorks program, which provides funding and technical assistance to select communities to develop and adopt an Active Transportation Plan or similar policy. Hear firsthand from Quakertown Alive! about how they have benefitted from a WalkWorks grant, as they discuss the importance of connecting different community plans, processes, results, and recommended actions, and how their work can be adapted by other communities.

Are you interested in undertaking community engagement to inform a trial project? Many organizations understand that efforts to gather feedback about conservation projects are necessary, yet community engagement for such projects is often used to affirm existing assumptions rather than an opportunity to gain new perspectives. As a result, workshops and surveys often barely scrape the surface of meaningful inclusion and engagement, resulting in feedback that is unintentionally biased and incomplete, and perpetuate the exclusion of marginalized communities in the conservation and outdoor sphere. This interactive workshop will detail the community engagement process undertaken by the Penn Trails Team for a large scale trail master plan in upstate New York, including a community engagement process designed to include input of non-traditional, or potential trail user communities. Stakeholder feedback was used to address issues of inclusion and access in the trail system and enhance community relationships. Learn about how you can design a similar process, including the values that established the project design, methods of listening more deeply, and how feedback was integrated into trail designs and the final master plan. This workshop will also explore limitations and lessons learned to allow your land trust to explore what is appropriate for you.

The Corry Junction Greenway Trail has been historically used by trail enthusiasts, but 2020 drove usage to double from July 2020 through February 2021! Like most areas, Corry’s finances tightened with COVID. How to develop trails then? What was needed? What started as a question has morphed into a plan and movement to extend trails in and around Corry. To link green spaces and provide places and opportunities for individuals to meet each other and talk instead of just waving when passing each other in cars. This session will describe what was done right, what was missed and what would be modified. The session will also provide insight to inventory community skills and organize for success, as well as discuss the surprise benefit of improving community relationships and offer methods to leverage that for success.

Team members from the Pennsylvania Environmental Council will share experiences and lessons gleaned from conducting the Erie to Pittsburgh/PA Wilds Gap Assessment Report. This presentation will highlight the importance of taking a look at conditions beyond maps and aerials. The team will discuss constraints as well as the process employed to characterize trail type.

The Lackawanna Luzerne Transportation Study Metropolitan Planning Organization led a two city, two county bicycle and pedestrian study in the Central Business Districts (CBD) of Scranton and Wilkes-Barre. The two cities have long distance trails that will eventually connect to them. The study examined destinations within each CBD, outside the city and into the suburbs, routes currently used, and routes pedestrians and cyclist prefer to use. Over a half a dozen public input methods were used to gather input throughout the study in a multitude of in-person meetings, on-site visits, and online formats. Various types of bicycle facilities were examined to provide a network that met all ages, abilities, and skills. The proposed bicycle networks for each city connected the CBD to the long-distance trails and proposed a system of various bicycle facilities to incorporate all streets within the CBD, as well as, various comfort levels of the cyclist. Join us as we unfold the unique approach of the Central Business District Pedestrian and Bicycle study of Scranton and Wilkes-Barre.

This session will provide information on the PennDOT Connects Process. Participants will learn how a partnership with PennDOT can be a positive experience for their communities; the importance of crafting and updating current plans such as bike/ped plans and comprehensive plans to gain support for the request; and funding opportunities that can be combined into a project to achieve requests, such as sidewalk additions.

As outdoor recreational interests have soared this summer, finding the balance of meeting needs and protecting natural resources is a growing challenge. Add on increasing threats to infrastructure from climate change, recreation providers will need to adopt sustainable practices as standard practice. Jeremy will share how to develop, maintain and manage sustainable trails and trail-based recreation.

This session presents the benefits and challenges of developing sustainable trail systems on conserved land. Trail development and maintenance can be daunting, but every hour of staff time is multiplied through the fruits of volunteerism and partnerships. Trails are intrinsic to protecting land and connecting people to the land. From partnerships to public engagement, from funding to stewardship, trails serve as both conduit and interface for nature immersion. Just as wildlife needs both core refuges and connective corridors, people need trails to enjoy nature and to serve as land stewards. Trails are recreational assets, but they are equally valuable for monitoring and restoration of terrestrial, riparian and aquatic habitats. Hollow Oak will present examples where greenway planning has prompted conservation projects, partnerships, funding, and organizational growth. Participants will learn how to incorporate greenways and sustainable trail design into existing conservation programs.