By Sue Frisch

In just three years, Norfolk’s Rails to Trails committee has gone from being a brand-new group to being custodians of a state-approved rail trail—the North Brook trail—along a state-owned segment of Norfolk’s decommissioned railroad bed, which snakes roughly east-west through town. Now the committee is reapplying for the $187,000 state grant that was approved but not funded last year. If the application succeeds, the money will pay for widening and surfacing the trail so that cyclists, joggers, walkers and even wheelchairs and strollers can comfortably use it.

Committee chair Robert Gilchrest says he thinks the chances that they will get the money are good, especially since the state has now approved their use of the property for a rail trail. And, he adds, Norfolk Rails to Trails will be able to point to its Oct. 27 Tour de Forest as proof that it is actively engaging the public. “They love this kind of thing,” he says.

What exactly is the Tour de Forest? Gilchrest describes it as a recreational bike ride with educational rest stops along the way. The route starts at the Curling Club, goes west along Mountain Road past Wangum Lake, south on Canaan Mountain Road, then east through Great Mountain Forest and back through the center of town to end at the Curling Club again. Information about the event, with a map and a link to sign up, is posted on the group’s Facebook page: https://www.facebook.com/norfolkrailstotrails/. Great Mountain Forest will get 25 percent of the proceeds from the registration fees, with the rest going to help fund Rails to Trails; business sponsors are helping to cover costs.

It will take a state grant, not money from a bike tour, to fund resurfacing the North Brook trail. But once that is successfully completed, the committee would like to take on another section of the railroad bed. The group is leaning toward the Wood Creek segment, Gilchrest says, because the route—yet to be worked out—would lead to the center of town and make it easier for residents to get to and use the North Brook trail. Then, they hope, would come the Stoney Lonesome section owned by the Norfolk Land Trust, and others after that.

Since about 25 percent of the old railroad bed is on private land, committee members know the rail trail will have to take detours, but they hope that it will eventually run from one side of Norfolk to the other, ideally meeting similar trails in North Canaan and Winchester. “We can only do Norfolk,” Gilchrest says, “but this east-west trail is important because it potentially connects north-south routes on either side of us.” He hopes that North Canaan, Winchester and Norfolk can work together and become a key link in the larger network.

All this development will take a lot of time and energy. Right now the committee has 10 members, who, along with the Church of Christ’s youth group, are the principal volunteers. Gilchrest hopes that more townspeople will get interested, use the trails and support the committee’s work any way they can. He and the other members welcome anyone to their meetings, held in Town Hall every second Thursday of the month at 6 p.m. “This is a project to benefit the entire town,” he says. “It’s important that people have a chance to have a say.”

Photo, top, by Christopher Little.