David Brickley Honored by Rails to Trails Conservancy

The Rails-to-Trails Conservancy (RTC) commemorated its 25th anniversary by recognizing individuals who have made extraordinary contributions to the rail-trail movement during the past quarter century.

Among the honorees of the inaugural Doppelt Family Rail-Trail Champions Award was longtime Virginia trail advocate David Brickley, who as both a legislator and leader in conservation and recreation planning has made an enormous contribution to the trails movement in Virginia and surrounding states.

Brickley is president of the September 11th National Memorial Trail Alliance, which is promoting the development of a 1,130-mile trail and greenway connecting the three memorial sites of the September 11, 2001 terrorist attacks on the United States: the Flight 93 National Memorial in Shanksville, Pa., the Pentagon Memorial and New York City’s National September 11 Memorial.

Under Brickley’s leadership as the director of the Virginia Department of Conservation and Rec­reation from 1998 to 2002, Virginia was awarded the national gold medal award for the “Best Managed State Park System in America.”

Brickley previously was an elected member of the Virginia House of Delegates from 1976 through 1998, and the legislative sponsor, co-founder and chairman of the Virginia Railway Express, Virginia’s commuter rail system. He also served as an officer and trustee of the East Coast Greenway Alliance, and as the Virginia State Committee Chair.

“The rail-trail movement has been extremely fortunate to have many senior elected officials and parks staff as strong supporters of our mission,” says RTC President Keith Laughlin. “David Brickley heads that list. His work on behalf of trails and greenways in Virginia during the past 30 years is a tremendous gift to his state and visitors from across the country.”

Additionally, Brickley personally purchased a 16-mile out-of-service railroad corridor in King George County, Va., to protect it from being lost to development. As president of the Dahlgren Rail­road Heritage Trail Alliance, his goal is to work with other volunteers to make this rail-trail project a part of the Potomac Heritage National Scenic Trail.

Congratulations.  And thanks for all your hard work, David!

Dear Amtrak: cyclists like us want to help you be successful – if you’d only let us!

For several years, the Virginia Bicycling Federation been asking Amtrak to make it easier to take our bikes on their trains.  We think its a win for Amtrak by increasing ridership, and a win for cyclists who would like to carry their bikes to destinations for touring, recreation, or making the final connection on their trips, excursions and vacations.

As things stand now, if a person wants to carry their bike on a train in Virginia, they must disassemble the bike and box it — a hassle at best, but a deal breaker for someone who isn’t handy with a wrench.   For someone not mechanically inclined, they would need to take a trip to a bike shop to break their bike down and box it –  which, of course, precludes riding your bike to the train station — and do the same at their destination.  A deal breaker for all but the most dedicated.

You then must pay a special handling fee to Amtrak to transport the bike.

Multiply all this by two for the return trip home.

I think most would agree this is a hassle.

We’ve asked Amtrak to reconsider their policy and carry unboxed bikes – heaven forbid – but have been told  they would need need new, high-tech baggage cars make this difficult situation work.

According to Jay McArthur,  Amtrak’s Principal Officer for Policy and Development:

Roll-on/roll-off bicycle carriage is not possible at this time on our Crescent and Silver Service routes which run through Virginia to and from New Orleans and Florida.  This service is provided on a small number of Amtrak services, primarily those where states have provided short-distance equipment that features low-level boarding and bicycle racks in cars that are accessible to passengers.  The equipment on these trains does not feature low-level boarding nor is there space for bicycles without taking away space already used for coach seats or racks for other passengers’ carry-on bags.  There is a baggage car, but the doors and floor of that car are three-to-four feet above platform level, the car is not accessible to passengers, and the car does not have bicycle racks

Fast forward to 1955.

(Go to 1:30 in the video for the innovative BTF bike storage solution.)

Adventure Cycling forwarded a link to an old British Rail Board video I had seen a while ago. Funny how British Rail solved this difficult problem 56 years ago.  What did these geniuses do to solve such a dilemma as carrying unboxed bikes?  As they tell us in their video, they put hooks in the baggage car:  

“A properly equipped touring cycle can be quite a bit of expensive machinery… and the owner of such a machine is inclined to be fussy about how it is carried.  So what do the railways  do?  They hang it on a rubber covered hook… Because after careful investigation the Cycle Touring Commission of the International Touring Alliance decided this was the way to carry cycles by train.

The cyclist hands his unboxed bike to the baggage handler

The handler gently places the front wheel on the hook

Note an entire baggage car filled with bikes? Does that help profits?

Voila: the BTF Bike Solution Circa 1955

A British Rail station filled with happy cyclists

Why, we ask, doesn’t Amtrak take a lesson from our British brethren in the fifties and make it easy to carry bikes on trains? Perhaps they would find, as in the BTF film, that their trains would be filled with happy, Sunday morning cyclists, enjoying a cup of tea and weekend excursion on Amtrak!

Richmond Times Dispatch columnist Bill Lohmann enjoys exploring Virginia on two wheels.  Here’s his take on riding the Virginia Creeper and other off road trails across the Commonwealth. 

(Just watch out for those fast closing cow gates!)

The Southeast High Speed Rail Corridor proposed to run from Petersburg, Virginia to Raleigh, North Carolina includes a a bike and pedestrian trail as an integral part of the project.

If completed, this 160 mile trail would connect  the towns and cities of Southside Virginia with these major metropolitan areas as well as the Tobacco Heritage Trail network.

This trail project would  be an ideal location for the East Coast Greenway and an ideal test case for implementation of a major rail-with-trail project.  Should potential federal rail-with-trail legislation pass, it might set the trend for many future rail enhancement projects.

Having the trail separated out as a standalone project, as some have suggested, might seriously threaten the likelihood that the trail would be completed.

We need your help to let officials know that we want this rail-with-trail to be included as an integral part of this rail project.

For more details on the project and a list of public hearings, see: www.sehsr.org or by by clicking here.

Click here to complete the online feedback form.  Please ask that a bike and pedestrian project be include as an integral and part of the project.

Please also sign our Rails-With-Trails Petition, and get your organization to write a letter of support for our Rails With Trails Resolution.

Riders on the VA Creeper Rail-to-Trail Near Damascus, VA

Virginia continues to add rails-to-trails projects to its already rich inventory of trails and greenways across the Commonwealth.  Rails-to-trails offer citizens of all ages and fitness levels trails for walking, cycling, exercise, outdoor pleasure and alternative transportation in localities across the Old Dominion.

As  recently featured on PBS’s Virginia Currents television magazine, the James River Branch Trail in South Richmond is just the latest example of another rail-to-trail to potentially be added to the hundreds of miles already in Virginia’s inventory.

According to the Rails to Trails Conservancy, Virginia has 32 rail-trails totaling 283 miles.  There are another 12 active projects which, when completed, will add 69 additional miles of trails in the Commonwealth.  Some of Virginia’s best examples of rails to trails include the Virginia Creeper Trail, the New River Trail, the W&OD Trail, the newly opened High Bridge Trail and the extensive Tobacco Heritage Trail project. 

Nationally, there are 1,631 open rail-trails totaling over 19,578 miles! Another 724 projects are in development which, when completed, will add about 8700 additional miles.

Rails-to-trails projects offer health and environmental benefits, and provide recreation and transportation for local citizens.  Frequently, these rail-trails attract thousands of visitors, creating jobs and bringing tourist dollars to local economies. 

How It All Began

In the 1970′s, many railroads were facing severe business difficulties and miles of rail corridor were being sold off or even abandoned.   Congress allowed rail lines to eliminate  unprofitable lines with relative ease.  By jettisoning these corridors,   many rights-of-way were to permanently disappear and Congress realized it might be almost impossible to reassemble these corridors should demand change in the future.  These corridors were being abandoned at an alarming rate – 4000 to 8000 miles per year – and a valuable national resource was being lost.

With this in mind, Congress passed legislation in 1976 called the Railroad Revitalization and Regulatory Reform Act, creating the first Rails-to-Trails Grant Program. 

The Rails to Trails Act of 1983 allowed the railroads to “railbank” these corridors by allowing abandoned rail lines to be converted into trails for hiking, biking, equestrian and transportation purposes.  Currently, 301 corridors have been successfully railbanked totaling 5,079 miles, and 92 are currently in negotiation, while 159 corridors were abandoned when railbanking negotiations were unsuccessful. Of the railbanked corridors, 120, representing 2,764 miles, are presently open to the public for use as trails and 72 corridors representing 1,122 miles are currently under development. 

As a result of railbanking, these rail corridors are preserved for future use, while providing multiple benefits to the communities in which they are located.

A converted train trestle along the VA Creeper

A New Concept for Trail Development:  Rails-With-Trails

Virginia is leading the way in developing an exciting new trail concept called Rails-WITH-Trails, or trails along activerailway lines.   There are over 3000 miles of railroads cris-crossing Virginia.   As billions of tax dollars are being spent to enhance and improve active rail corridors, organizations like the Virginia Bicycling Federation are asking that trails be included as an integral part of these projects.  To learn more about RWTs,  see www.railswithtrails.com .

To see a comprehensive list of existing Virginia rails-to-trails, visit the Rails to Tails Conservancy’s TrailLink website.

The Eastern Trail Alliance, a New England based trail group responsible for developing a trail from Portsmouth, New Hampshire to South Portland, Maine, is the latest group to sign on in support of the VBF”s Rails-With-Trails petition.  This petition asks that trails be included whenever tax dollars are used to upgrade or enhance rail corridors.

“History is on our side,” said John Andrews, President of the Alliance and former president of Saco Trails, “With more rails with trails, hundreds of lives can be saved, community health can be improved… Fuel can be saved…  America can be an even more wonderful place to live, work and play.”

The Eastern Trail is being built along the old Eastern Railroad Corridor, the first railroad to connect Boston, Massachusetts to Portland, Maine, operating from 1842 until 1944.   Since then, the corridor has been used by utility companies for natural gas and electricity transmission.

The Eastern Trail is also the Southern Maine section of the East Coast Greenway, a proposed network of trails to connect Calais, Maine with Key West, Florida.

Jonathan Maus, Editor in Chief of BikePortland’s website recently interviewed Adventure Cycling’s Ginny Sullivan regarding the US Bike Route System.

Towards the end of the interview, Jonathan asked Ginny about how rails-with-trails factored into the discussion regarding high-speed rail, and whether RWT and high-speed rail are compatible.

Ginny referenced the article, “Trails and High-Speed Rail – Are They Compatible“ by Alta Planning’s Mia Birk, which debunks most of the myths.  The  article concludes:

…that at a distance of 30 feet, a train moving at 90 mph does not create significant negative impacts on trail users. These results only confirm the previous conclusions of the Federal Railroad Administration which conducted its own test, using an even higher testing speed (150 mph). Bottom line: the presence of high speed rail is not a legitimate reason for objecting to a rail with trails project.

To see how well rails with trails are working already, see the latest rails-with-trails survey from California (November, 2009).

Rails with trails: San Francisco Bay Trail (photo: Rails to Trails Conservancy)

The Rails to Trails Conservancy has just released a new report, titled, “California Rails-with-Trails: A Survey of Trails Along Active Rail Lines.” This report was designed to update data collected for the RTC’s 2000 rail with trail report.

Some conclusions from the 2009 California survey:

• Safety:  there were no incidents between a trail user and a train.  In fact, using a rail-with-trail may well be significantly safer than walking or cycling next to a busy main road and it may serve to keep people from walking on active rail tracks.
• Growth:  California now has 21 RWT projects, up from 7 in the 2000 study.
• Dual benefit:  constructing a trail along an active railroad doubles the value a community derives from the rail corridor and provides citizens with an extra transportation choice.
• Liability: the survey revealed the vast majority of rails-with-trails are insured by existing city or transit district insurance coverage in a similar manner to other trails.

Despite opponents’ rhetoric against rails with trails, this study seems to reinforce what many already know: rails with trails make safe and practical bike and pedestrian trails, and communities across the United States should include rails with trails as part of their comprehensive transportation infrastructure.

Support continues to grow for rails with trails as the Morris Area Freewheelers, a northern New Jersey bike club, has signed on to support the  VBF’s Rails With Trails resolution and efforts to require inclusion of bike and pedestrian facilities in government-funded rail enhancement projects.

With the addition of the Morris Area Freewheelers, there are now 34 national, statewide and local organizations supporting the RWT effort.

“We recognize the physical health, mental health, energy savings, and global warming implications of increasing the national bike-friendly infrastructure,” said said Jay Marowitz, President of the club.  “We feel that rails plus trails is a key component of this infrastructure and support this great project.”

Morris Area Freewheelers has over 650 members ranging in age from 18 to 84.  Most members   reside in   Morris,  Sussex, Hunterdon, Essex, Somerset, Warren, Union, and Passaic in northern New Jersey.

The Virginia Department of Rail and Public Transportation (DRPT) is applying for about $590 million in federal stimulus money to make a series of rail improvements in the Richmond area. 

These improvements are needed for the development of a high-speed rail corridor through Richmond.

Between $90 and $100 million of these improvements will be used to speed passenger trains through Richmond’s ACCA yard.  This enhancement would allow passenger trains to move through the yards at 45mph, rather than slowing them to 10mph as is required by the current design.

Though the new route would be a great connector between the northern and western suburbs of Henrico County, and between the City of Richmond and downtown, there is no mention of bike-ped access either across or along the new rail line.

Rails with trails can provide important connections both within, and between, our communities.