In a classic example of how many people it often takes to make a project work, ECTA recently completed a bridge and boardwalk on the Discover Hamilton Trail.
The bridge, completed in May, was designed by Bob Weatherall of Weatherall Design, completed by several volunteers, permitted through our Hamilton Trail Management Plan, and funded with a grant from our great friends and supporters at REI. The bridge crosses a massive culvert that goes under the MBTA railroad track, over a beaver deceiver which was put in by Skip Lisle of Beaver Deceivers International through ECTA, and funded by the Fields Pond Foundation. Access to the site was permitted by John and Linda Donovan through Devon Glen Farm.
A 60-foot boardwalk, funded by REI and the New England Biolabs Corporate Giving Program, was completed in July to replace an existing boardwalk that was in disrepair. Chip Cheston of Tasks Unlimited managed the construction.
This project is one piece in the larger efforts to rejuvenate, relocate, sign and map the Discover Hamilton Trail, a trail that will start at Patton Park and go across several private trails with the very generous permission of the landowners, through Bradley Palmer State Park, a portion of The Trustees of Reservations Appleton Farm Grass Rides, and Essex County Greenbelt’s Pingree Reservation.
As written about in last fall’s newsletter, ECTA has received a generous grant from the Hamilton Community Preservation Committee to relocate, map and sign the trail, and then to publicize the trail through ECTA and the Town’s websites and produce maps for trail users.
We expect the Discover Hamilton Trail Project to be a recreational gem for the local communities and plan to have it completed in late 2012. We want to thank the many people and organizations involved in making this project a reality.