((PKG)) HEYWARD COMMUNITY FOREST TRAILS
((Banner: A Community Forest))
((Reporter: Martin Secrest))
((Camera: Philip Alexiou, Martin Secrest))
((Editors: Philip Alexiou, Martin Secrest))
((Map: Charlottesville, Virginia))
((Main character: 1 male))
((NATS/MUSIC))
((Popup Banner))
A community forest was recently acquired by the city of
Charlottesville, with a donation from the landowner and the
help of a federal grant.))
((NATS/MUSIC))
((Chris Gensic, Parks and Trails Planner, Charlottesville,
Virginia))
I'm deputized to go out and buy land in the city, maybe just
at the city limits, in order to construct a trail system, while
this land, this is now the community's forest effectively.
((NATS/MUSIC))
((Chris Gensic, Parks and Trails Planner, Charlottesville,
Virginia))
We ask, would you rather the trail be on this side of the
hollow or that side of the hollow or should we build two
trails? And the community is already heavily involved. The
trails you see behind me were built by volunteers.
((NATS/MUSIC))
((Chris Gensic, Parks and Trails Planner, Charlottesville,
Virginia))
Lets go right up here. I think theres good rock stuff. Not
very far.
((NATS/MUSIC))
((Chris Gensic, Parks and Trails Planner, Charlottesville,
Virginia))
One of the bits of trail maintenance is to let them settle for a
while.
((NATS/MUSIC))
((Chris Gensic, Parks and Trails Planner, Charlottesville,
Virginia))
So, here's an example where the hill used to come across
like this and we have cut in the back, made the flat surface,
so you're running this way. And then you lay that piece
back, so the water still wants to come down and this trail still
slopes outward just enough that water keeps going like that.
This is a very good example section of where they had to
come along here with their picks and pick into the hillside.
And you can see they cut through a root here and then you
lay it out flat. And then once it's in here, this could be here
for 50 to 100 years as long as it's stable and drains well
and that's our goal.
((NATS/MUSIC))
((Chris Gensic, Parks and Trails Planner, Charlottesville,
Virginia))
This is a section here where we will be building a trail around
and up into that hollow. You can see we've started laying
out the pink flags. It's generally pretty easy to tell volunteers
spread out along that line of pink flags. By the end of the
day, you connect all those dots and you have one
continuous trail. Had the COVID not hit, we would probably
have most of the trails built now.
((NATS/MUSIC))
((Chris Gensic, Parks and Trails Planner, Charlottesville,
Virginia))
We had a big blowdown storm come through here two
weeks ago. When this tree decides to fall across the trail,
this is when I come out or some of our crew members and
we would just cut through enough that people can walk
through it. And they also offer an opportunity for
education. We can interpret these tree rings and you can
say, Okay, this is an 80-year-old tree. Some of the trees
we cut are about this big around. So, you know, what we'd
probably do is use one of those really big ones. The bad
thing is we have to cut through trees that are about this big
around every so often. So, we might as well use them for
education.
((NATS/MUSIC))
((Chris Gensic, Parks and Trails Planner, Charlottesville,
Virginia))
Just behind me and down the hill is the small city of
Charlottesville. Theres about 50-thousand people in the
city. You'll see how this looks a lot like a trail. Its going to
look a lot more like a trail very soon. This will become
the off-road bicycle-jog-hike up here. You've got this lovely
creek next to you.
((NATS/MUSIC))
((Chris Gensic, Parks and Trails Planner, Charlottesville,
Virginia))
So, the final step here is to open the front door to all of these
woods to the big community down the hill, get them to start
coming up here and enjoying it for swimming, for hiking,
learning about nature. And that's really what the point of all
of this kind of stuff is in the end, is creating a public space for
people to come do those things.
((NATS))
((Banner: A Community Forest))
((Reporter: Martin Secrest))
((Camera: Philip Alexiou, Martin Secrest))
((Editors: Philip Alexiou, Martin Secrest))
((Map: Charlottesville, Virginia))
((Main character: 1 male))
((NATS/MUSIC))
((Popup Banner))
A community forest was recently acquired by the city of
Charlottesville, with a donation from the landowner and the
help of a federal grant.))
((NATS/MUSIC))
((Chris Gensic, Parks and Trails Planner, Charlottesville,
Virginia))
I'm deputized to go out and buy land in the city, maybe just
at the city limits, in order to construct a trail system, while
this land, this is now the community's forest effectively.
((NATS/MUSIC))
((Chris Gensic, Parks and Trails Planner, Charlottesville,
Virginia))
We ask, would you rather the trail be on this side of the
hollow or that side of the hollow or should we build two
trails? And the community is already heavily involved. The
trails you see behind me were built by volunteers.
((NATS/MUSIC))
((Chris Gensic, Parks and Trails Planner, Charlottesville,
Virginia))
Lets go right up here. I think theres good rock stuff. Not
very far.
((NATS/MUSIC))
((Chris Gensic, Parks and Trails Planner, Charlottesville,
Virginia))
One of the bits of trail maintenance is to let them settle for a
while.
((NATS/MUSIC))
((Chris Gensic, Parks and Trails Planner, Charlottesville,
Virginia))
So, here's an example where the hill used to come across
like this and we have cut in the back, made the flat surface,
so you're running this way. And then you lay that piece
back, so the water still wants to come down and this trail still
slopes outward just enough that water keeps going like that.
This is a very good example section of where they had to
come along here with their picks and pick into the hillside.
And you can see they cut through a root here and then you
lay it out flat. And then once it's in here, this could be here
for 50 to 100 years as long as it's stable and drains well
and that's our goal.
((NATS/MUSIC))
((Chris Gensic, Parks and Trails Planner, Charlottesville,
Virginia))
This is a section here where we will be building a trail around
and up into that hollow. You can see we've started laying
out the pink flags. It's generally pretty easy to tell volunteers
spread out along that line of pink flags. By the end of the
day, you connect all those dots and you have one
continuous trail. Had the COVID not hit, we would probably
have most of the trails built now.
((NATS/MUSIC))
((Chris Gensic, Parks and Trails Planner, Charlottesville,
Virginia))
We had a big blowdown storm come through here two
weeks ago. When this tree decides to fall across the trail,
this is when I come out or some of our crew members and
we would just cut through enough that people can walk
through it. And they also offer an opportunity for
education. We can interpret these tree rings and you can
say, Okay, this is an 80-year-old tree. Some of the trees
we cut are about this big around. So, you know, what we'd
probably do is use one of those really big ones. The bad
thing is we have to cut through trees that are about this big
around every so often. So, we might as well use them for
education.
((NATS/MUSIC))
((Chris Gensic, Parks and Trails Planner, Charlottesville,
Virginia))
Just behind me and down the hill is the small city of
Charlottesville. Theres about 50-thousand people in the
city. You'll see how this looks a lot like a trail. Its going to
look a lot more like a trail very soon. This will become
the off-road bicycle-jog-hike up here. You've got this lovely
creek next to you.
((NATS/MUSIC))
((Chris Gensic, Parks and Trails Planner, Charlottesville,
Virginia))
So, the final step here is to open the front door to all of these
woods to the big community down the hill, get them to start
coming up here and enjoying it for swimming, for hiking,
learning about nature. And that's really what the point of all
of this kind of stuff is in the end, is creating a public space for
people to come do those things.
((NATS))
