The Huckleberry Trail
Heritage Park & Trail System
2000 Users Survey: Overview
According to Charles Little, author of Greenways for America, “to
make a greenway is to make a community.” On any given Saturday, it is possible
to sit at the midpoint of the Huckleberry Trail and watch the diversity of Montgomery
County, Blacksburg, and Christiansburg pass by: joggers, power walkers, and
strollers; mall shoppers; wildflower collectors; single cyclists and families
with small children still in the training wheel stage; Tech students; and residents
of Warm Hearth. Unlike traditional parks which require most residents to drive
to a specific access point in order to use the recreational facilities, the
Huckleberry Trail provides nearly immediate recreational access (either without
driving or with a minimum amount of driving required) to residents in three
jurisdictions and a significant number of neighborhoods (including town center
in Blacksburg, the Tech campus, Warm Hearth, Merrimac, the Oak Forest and Forest
Park Mobile Home Parks, and the neighborhoods surrounding the New River Valley
Mall (see Figure 1.1) While the trail does not provide significant individual
neighborhood access at the Christiansburg end of the Huckleberry Trail, sufficient
parking is available to accommodate a large number of users.
Greenways, trails, and heritage trails not only provide communities with nearly
immediate recreational access, but also provide a broad range of economic, cultural,
and social benefits as well. According to the National Park Service’s Rivers,
Trails and Conservation Assistance Program:
Rivers, trails, and greenway corridors (linear open spaces connecting recreational,
cultural, and natural areas) are traditionally recognized for their environmental
protection, recreation values, and aesthetic appearances. These corridors also
have the potential to create jobs, enhance property values, expand local businesses,
attract new or relocating businesses, increase local tax revenues, decrease local
government expenditures, and promote a local community.
In their report, Economic Impacts of Protecting Rivers, Trails, and Greenway
Corridors (1995), the National Park Service cited specific types of benefits
connected to the development of heritage trails and greenway systems, including:
- Increased property values;
- Increased tax revenues (due to the rise in property values)
which can be used to offset the cost of acquisition of right-of-ways;
- Additional recreational benefits to adjacent and nearby homeowners
and residents;
- Increased outdoor and leisure expenditures by local residents and
visitors;
- Potential commercial uses, including tours, partnerships, special
events, and on-site or nearby concessions;
- Increased agency expenditures which contribute to economic activity
by providing payrolls and supporting a broad range of businesses;
- Decreases in healthcare costs for businesses and individuals
by providing immediate recreational and exercised-based activities;
- Increase in potential tourism dollars spent on overnight stays, equipment
rentals, meals, et al.;
- Potential draw for corporations and businesses, which increasingly site
the importance of quality of life in an area as a major factor in locating
businesses.
- Increase employee retention and employ fitness
- Decrease in pollution, healthcare costs, and hazard mitigation costs.
Charles Flink, Robert M. Searns, and Loring LaB. Schwarz, in Greenways:
A Guide to Planning Design, and Development suggest that greenways and trails
have three primary functions: 1) promote the natural values of the land, 2)
preserve a region’s cultural history, and 3) provide alternative modes
of recreation to area residents. The Huckleberry Trail achieves all three goals,
as well as providing alternative transportation routes between Blacksburg and
the market area of Christiansburg and erasing the jurisdictional differences
between users.
In Trails for the Twenty-First Century, Karen-Lee Ryan (the director
of publications for the Rails-to-Trails Conservancy) argues that rail-to-trails
projects represent “a new kind of public space” which provides “a
multi-use trail, that is close to home recreational area; ...can accommodate
a range of users, including ...walkers, bicyclists, joggers, cross-country skiers,
roller and in-line skaters, people in wheelchairs, hikers, [and] parents with
strollers...”; and serve “an important transportation purpose.”
Unlike traditional parks, linear parks and trails connect communities and “connect
things [within those communities] together--neighborhoods to community and cultural
resources (libraries, schools, businesses, museums, shops), small towns to metropolitan
areas; and city centers to countrysides--intrinsically serving as transportation
corridors.” In addition to providing recreational opportunities to a broad
range of users with a broader range of recreational interests, The Huckleberry
Trail also provides access to Blacksburg and Christiansburg for those living
in the isolated communities between the two. The trail provides access to shopping
opportunities to students in Blacksburg and at Virginia Tech without requiring
access to a vehicle and provides access to the public library in Blacksburg
to elementary and secondary school students living in the Merrimac area and
to residents of the Warm Hearth retirement community.
The Huckleberry Trail crosses through three different jurisdictions: Blacksburg,
Christiansburg, and Montgomery County (Figure 1.1). The diversity of users and
uses is the primary focus of this study. Since the Huckleberry Trail was completed
between downtown Blacksburg and the New River Valley Mall in Christiansburg,
no study has been done which examines the whole of the trail or takes into consideration
user concerns. Rather than treating the trail as three separate, albeit connected,
recreational facilities, the Montgomery County Planning Department chose, instead,
to include the entire trail inasmuch as neither the users nor their concerns
stop at jurisdictional boundaries. The survey was designed in order to provide
answers to a number of different questions:
- Who uses the Huckleberry Trail?
- Does the use vary depending on the user’s access point
to the trail?
- How is the Huckleberry Trail used?
- To what extent does the Huckleberry Trail contribute to the
overall quality of life in the communities and county?
- What do user’s see as the Huckleberry Trail’s strengths?
What do they like best?
- What problems or concerns do the users have with the Huckleberry
Trail?
- What changes would they make to the Huckleberry Trail?
- Do trail users feel safe using the Huckleberry Trail?
The information from the survey is intended to help the Montgomery County,
Blacksburg, and Christiansburg in a number of distinct ways: 1) to make a case
for extending and expanding the Heritage Trail system in Montgomery County,
Blacksburg, and Christiansburg; to provide needed evidence of trail use and
community interest in trails for the grant writing process; and, perhaps most
importantly, to help the three jurisdictions improve the existing trail by addressing
user concerns.
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