Campbell Riverites who use the Beaver Lodge Lands have a chance to give back to the community’s trail system by adopting one of its trails.
Two trails are up for adoption: Burrell’s Trail and Rockland Trail.
“The Beaver Lodge lands are not actually a park,” said Kyle Fitzpatrick, education coordinator for Greenways Land Trust. “The land is held by the Ministry of Forests. The maintenance is done by volunteers through Greenways.”
Through the program, trail adopters are responsible for the smaller scale maintenance. This includes tasks like pruning plants along the sides of the trail or picking up litter. For bigger tasks like fallen trees or branches, adopters flag the problem area with Greenways and they coordinate with the ministry and the Beaver Lodge Trust Society to assess and follow up with the proper solution.
Since the program’s inception, it has been fairly well received.
“Some people go above and beyond,” Fitzpatrick said. “We have volunteers from Carihi High who maintained a large road: the ERT Trail/Road and that’s very long trail/road … We don’t certainly don’t have those expectations that someone would have to do that. And usually the volunteers they work on trails that are on their walking route or biking route.”
Greenways supplies equipment for the volunteers, and also holds group maintenance days every now and again. These include workshops with experienced trail workers to ensure volunteers are following best practices.
“I think it’s just a really good symbol of our community,” Fitzpatrick said. “Just the community involvement in the Beaver Lodge lands and how well maintained they are … we’d like to see more of that, but we were certainly very proud of the program and we’re really impressed with all the volunteers who helped to keep the environment healthy.”
To volunteer, contact Fitzpatrick at kyle@greenwaystrust.ca.
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