Enfield
In a 2-1 vote last week, the Enfield Selectboard approved sending a letter to the state’s congressional delegation to request that ATVs remain banned from federally funded trails. Selectboard members John Kluge and Meredith Smith voted in favor; Chairman Fred Cummings voted against the resolution.
Meanwhile in August, the Selectboard in Andover, N.H., unanimously approved a similar resolution, according to Town Administrator Marjorie Roy.
Both communities are situated along the nearly 50-mile Northern Rail Trail, which runs to Lebanon from Boscawen, N.H.
“Allowing ATVs to use the Northern Rail Trail would significantly impede the ability of myriad user groups, residents and visitors to enjoy the trail for a variety of reasons, including public safety risks and physical damage to the trail itself,” Enfield’s letter to the delegation said.
The votes by the two boards were in response to other Granite State communities’ wishes to reopen some trails to off-road vehicles, according to Alex Bernhard, vice president of the Friends of the Northern Rail Trail in Merrimack County, which manages the southern portion of the trail.
Federal regulations currently ban motorized traffic on many trails because they were created with federal funding.
Bernhard, who lobbied for the resolutions passed in both town, worries any action to open a few trails to motorized traffic could lead to a change in how all trails are viewed by off-road drivers.
He plans to soon push for similar resolut in other rail trail communities, including Lebanon.
“ATVs destroy trails and drive their users out. The trails aren’t meant to be motorized,” Bernhard said in an interview last week.
However, some officials contend ATVs and pedestrians successfully coexisted for decades on portions of trails that are closed now to ATVs, and a recent enforcement of regulations has caused problems for established ATV clubs.
In 2016, the town of Haverhill was informed it no longer could allow ATVs on the popular Blackmount Rail Trail, a 5-mile trail between the villages of North Haverhill and Woodsville. The trail was purchased using $170,000 from the Federal Highway Administration’s Transportation Enhancement program, which told town officials that motorized vehicles were forbidden from trails intended to be used by pedestrians and cyclists.
Claremont also was forced to close a 2-mile trail near Washington Street that had been open between 1999 and 2014, after it was denied a federal waiver that would have allowed all-terrain and other off-road vehicles.
In response, Haverhill and Claremont sent letters this summer to the state’s congressional delegation requesting that it consider a legislative solution. The towns asked that ATVs and off-road vehicles be recognized as “transportation alternatives,” or that the government allow local officials to decide what’s allowed on the trails.
The municipalities also floated the idea of repaying the federal dollars, freeing them of FHA regulations.
Claremont Mayor Charlene Lovett said she hasn’t heard of any progress being made.
“We’re in a holding pattern,” she said last week.
While there’s been no effort to open the Northern Rail Trail to ATV traffic, some users in Enfield said they support the Selectboard resolution.
As she finished a walk on Sunday, Enfield resident Susan Brown said the trail is “an asset” that often is used by the community and visitors.
“You never see the rail trail without somebody here,” Brown said after walking her dog, Katie. “If you want (Katie’s) opinion, the rail trail is paradise. She loves it and we go every day at least once.”
However, Brown said she doesn’t see the trail as a good place for ATVs, saying it’s hard enough for some of the town’s older residents to navigate around cyclists. Brown uses a hearing aid, and said it’s difficult to hear bikes approaching from behind.
Wayne Stone also was walking his Chihuahua, Peanut, on the trail on Sunday morning.
The pair make daily trips using the trail to reach Petro Mart on Route 4, where Peanut has two playmates.
“There’s a lot of kids that walk on the rail trail,” Stone said, adding he doesn’t think ATVs will be able to safely navigate around families.
“I used to have one but I didn’t ride it on the rail trail because there’s trails you can go on specifically for (ATVs),” he said.
Dierdre and Mike Remick, of Epping, N.H., were bicycling on the trail this weekend during a visit to the Upper Valley. Both said they’ve biked on other trails, and seen evidence of ATV use.
“They tend to dig them up tendentiously,” Mike Remick said of the trails. “If there’s loose gravel, it makes it very, very rough.”
ATVs also tend to be faster than bicycles, Dierdre Remick added, leading to worries over accidents.
“You have a lot of people with strollers” on the trail, she said. “It’s not a good mix.”
Tim Camerato can be reached at tcamerato@vnews.com or 603-727-3223.