National Public Lands Day volunteers contribute to historic trail project, improve public lands across county
The 24th annual National Public Lands Day kicked off at 7 a.m. on Saturday with five projects for volunteers to choose from. This year’s event also featured the historic change on East Shore Trail to allow bikes, the first trail in a national park to ever do so. Other projects included planting trees at Hot Sulphur Springs Town Park, cleaning up the Colorado River by boat or raft, maintenance to the Continental Divide Trail and constructing a connection on the Sherman Creek Trail. Organizers estimated 200 to 250 volunteers would participate this year to help improve and maintain public lands and contribute work that government agencies don’t have the resources for.
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- Toby Martin, a Headwaters Trails Alliance employee, cuts larger trees into smaller pieces to make it easier to move them from the trail.
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- The East Shore Trail project that is one of five National Public Lands Day projects this year is historic because it is the first trail to ever allow bikes in a national park.
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- Delaney Garvin, an animal packer for the National Park Service, has participated in several public lands day projects and enjoys being a part of the day because she gets to meet people throughout the community.
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- Travis Caffee, a mule packer for the National Park Service, helps cut roots from the ground to remove the tree stump along the East Shore Trail Path. The East Shore Trail improvements was one of the four trails projects funded by the Open Lands, Rivers and Trails fund in spring 2017.
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- Dave Runck, Jim Mills and Chris Bennett pull stumps from the new trail path. Runck, who is from Golden and owns a home in Fraser, said he spends a lot of time on the trails and wanted to give back.
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- Izzie Ditmarson, a Headwaters Trails Alliance employee, sharpens her saw. One of the main safety concerns with rerouting the East Shore Trail was the dead standing lodgepole pine in the area, which HTA worked to down before volunteers arrived.
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- Leroy Taylor, from Winter Park, has participated in many National Public Lands Day projects. This year is helping to pull tree stumps from the new route on East Shore Trail.
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- Deer along the East Shore Trail enjoy the weather unbothered by workers less than a mile away.
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- Claudia Holler, a Denver resident who owns a home in Granby, works on rerouting the East Shore Trail in preparation for the trail becoming bike-friendly.
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