Friends of the Catskill Mountain Rail Trail Submits Letter to Ulster County Legislature Calling for Trail Connectivity
Kingston, NY — The Friends of the Catskill Mountain Rail Trail – a volunteer group organized by the Woodstock Land Conservancy to advocate for a trail connection from the Ashokan Rail Trail to Kingston – today submitted a letter to the Ulster County Legislature calling for a trail-only policy on the 1.7 mile “undesignated section” of the Ulster & Delaware Corridor.
The letter, which is endorsed by more than 200 local residents, urges the county to continue its long-standing commitment to shared train and trail uses on the publicly-owned corridor by preserving the CMRR’s current permit area for tourist trains while extending the Ashokan Rail Trail through the undesignated section.
In 2014 the county legislature adopted Resolution No. 275, which prioritized a trail connection from Kingston to Boiceville with the Boiceville-to-Phoenicia section reserved for tourist train operations. After a successful lobbying effort by the CMRR and its supporters, the County policy was revised by Resolution No. 488 of 2015, which offered an additional section for tourist train operations from Kingston to Milepost 8.33, at the intersection with Route 28A. The compromise maintained the county’s commitment to eventual trail connectivity between Boiceville and Kingston, however, and called for a trail to be co-located with the Kingston-based tourist train segment. The Friends of the Catskill Mountain Rail Trail supported this compromise, pending further examination of the feasibility of co-located rail and trail.
Notably, the 2015 policy established by Resolution No. 488 failed to decide the best and highest use of a 1.7 mile section of the corridor, from Route 28A to Basin Road. Since then, the CMRR has sought to gain control of this section to extend its tourist train rides. Despite the CMRR’s claim that a trail could be constructed next to the tracks, the exorbitant cost of doing so makes any extension of the tourist train a de facto reversal of the county’s policy to preserve trail connectivity.
As such, the time has come for the Ulster County Legislature to address this last portion of the corridor, which passes through federally-regulated wetlands and between narrow rock cuts. Given the enormous financial cost and environmental impact of any “rail-plus-trail” in this section — and recognizing that an extension of the CMRR’s permit area primarily benefits the private owners of the CMRR while the extension of the highly-successful Ashokan Rail Trail advances the goal of trail connectivity and offers access to the surrounding residential areas of Morgan Hill and Stony Hollow as well as the businesses and recreation facilities along Route 28 — the Friends of the Catskill Mountain Rail Trail calls on the U&D Corridor Advisory Committee to recommend a “trail-only” policy on the undesignated section.
Contrary to the CMRR’s claims, the Friend of the Catskill Mountain Rail Trail does not endorse or call for the termination of tourist train operations on the corridor. Instead, we invite supporters of the CMRR to review the materials on our website and reach out to us via the contact form if they are interested in a constructive, fact-based dialogue about the costs and benefits of various uses of the County-owned U&D Corridor.
In addition to the letter that was submitted to the Legislature, the Friends group will continue its advocacy campaign by sharing factual information and details to help inform the Legislature’s policy-making effort. Those interested in following our work are encouraged to sign-up for our periodic emails via the form at http://katrail.org.
