On a warm and sunny Saturday morning, members of the Squamish Trails Society were hard at work cleaning up items that had been found off a trail near Bailey Street.
There are about eight volunteers in total for the day. While a few are gearing up with rakes, shovels and buckets, a man on a morning walk with his dogs stops to thank the volunteers for their hard work and says he’ll look into volunteering with them as he’s had experience elsewhere.
Those are a few of the society’s main goals as the trails thaw into spring: raising awareness of what they do and, hopefully, getting more volunteers to work with them.
The Squamish Trails Society is a non-profit organization with volunteers dedicated to building and maintaining multi-use trails in and around Squamish.
President Matt Parker said they currently have about 200 volunteers on their email list, but many can only help a couple of times per year. Therefore, he said they are always looking for more, especially those who may be interested in management roles within the organization.
Joining the team is pretty simple; you can sign up on the society's website. The cost for a single person is $20 per year.
Some of the activities the society does include clean up as well as brush backing trails.
Brush backing includes “trimming the trails” and raking them so they are easily usable, said volunteer Gillian Bexton.
The group also has outlined a few larger projects in 2023 that they aim to tackle, which will help make trails easier and more accessible for people. Here are some of the proposed projects:
- Freshening and resurfacing the Loggers Creek Trail
- Resurfacing sections of the Centennial Trail
- Resurfacing sections of the Mashiter – Mamquam Spawning Channel Trails
- Improving access and sustainability of the Swan Trail in the estuary
- Working with the District of Squamish to revitalize the Dark Roast Connector
- Dentville Trail surface improvements and maintenance
- Smoothing rough or wet areas of the Wonderland Trail
- Exploring areas where the southern end of the Sea to Sky Trail can be moved off the road
There will also be continued consultation with the District and developers about trail connectivity as well as responding to trail needs in local neighbourhoods.
For more information, visit SquamishTrails.ca or find the society on Facebook or Twitter.
