Montour Trail-Letter

Volume 13, Issue 4

July/August, 2002

The Montour Trail Council is working to fill in multiple gaps in their trail network between Clairton and Coraopolis.

Construction that started last year to construct trail from Route 837 in Clairton to near Route 51 in Large will be completed this year. This segment will be about two and a half miles long.

The engineering design for remaining trail in South Park Township also has been progressing. For this work, the Montour Trail Council has contracted with A & A Consultants. Emphasis has been placed on completing the design of two trail segments: The first segment will connect Pleasant Street in South Park to the Peters Township line, including installing a concrete deck on the 500 foot long trestle over Route 88. The second segment will extend eastward about a half mile from near Triphammer Road.

On May 28, construction got underway on a three-quarter mile section of trail that will link the Montour Trail Bethel Park Spur to the Arrowhead Trail at Brush Run Road in Peters Township. When work is completed later this year, there will be almost seven miles of continuous trail for bicyclists and pedestrians there. Much of this effort will involve adding fill near Brush Run Road to reduce the slope of the trail.

The Montour Trail Council previously hired Mackin Engineering to design all remaining un-built 'mainline' trail in Washington County. This design work is nearly complete, and funding has been secured to build all but a two miles of the trail that Mackin has designed. Construction may begin as soon as the fall of 2002.

On April 12, the Council celebrated the opening of a 2.6-mile trail segment in Findlay Township in Allegheny County and Robinson Township of Washington County. This completed an 18-mile segment between Coraopolis and McDonald. Before completion of this missing link, the 11-mile segment from Coraopolis to Moon was seeing 1000 trail users per day on most summer Saturdays and Sundays.

The Montour Trail Council is an all-volunteer organization that is overseeing development of 48 miles of 'mainline' trail between Coraopolis and Clairton and of numerous spur trails in between. They receive funding from dues paid by their 800 members, from local foundations, from the Allegheny County Regional Asset District, from DCNR and Keystone Grants from the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, and from ISTEA and TEA-21 funds from the Federal Government.

The Trail Council is always looking for volunteers to help out. Trail Council activists have a wide variety of skills similar to a medium sized business. There are engineers, fundraisers, work party organizers, manual laborers, groundskeepers, attorneys, and marketing people.

Information about the Montour Trail Council can be found at www.montourtrail.org, at www.atatrail.org, and by calling 412-831-2030. For information about the Montour Trail in South Park or to volunteer in the South Park area, send email to Paul McKeown at mckeownp@libcom.com or call him at 412-835-6692.

Editor's note: This article previously appeared in Park News of South Park Township.