Elkinton: Those most likely to make it through the feasibility and establishment process are those with the strongest constituency and political support. It seems that every new trail "stretches the box" of what a national trail might be. For example, the newly created Captain John Smith Chesapeake National Historic Trail lies entirely in the waters of the Chesapeake Bay and its tidewater estuaries. In the past, trails have largely been on land. This one opens up new questions of how best to access the trail, how to provide interpretive experiences, how to patrol and do law enforcement, and how to mark the route.
Smith: Now that the Bicentennial of the Lewis and Clark Expedition of Discovery (1803-1806) has concluded along the Lewis and Clark National Historic Trail, what effect did that event have on the National Trails System and what lessons can be learned from this multi-year commemoration?
Elkinton: The answer to this question would be an entire book. The Lewis and Clark Bicentennial was a once in a lifetime event for all of us involved. Not only were there over a dozen major signature events along the route – each resulting from years of planning – but thousands of travelers and hundreds of communities became involved. The National Park Service hosted a traveling exhibit space – called Corps of Discovery II – that included a performance tent that brought music, storytelling, craft exhibits, and tribal ceremonies to audiences all along the trail.
From my perspective, the lessons of the Bicentennial for anyone involved in the National Trails System include:
- Anniversaries can be powerful organizing events, but plan from the beginning for the period after the party is over;
- Use the event(s) to raise your organization’s membership.
- You can never have too many websites.
- Successful partnerships draw in new partners. Be ready to enlarge the circle.
- Stress the educational value of the story – that became the common thread throughout the participation of the 22 Federal agencies involved.
- Start raising money early. Trails may not compete well at first in the funding priorities of corporations and charitable foundations.
- For a big multi-year event, it’s not too early to start planning 10 years in advance.
Smith: How do you plan to commemorate the 40th anniversary of the National Trails System Act in 2008?
Elkinton: I am still collecting ideas. The National Park Service has already invested in an oral history project to find out some of the details of the passage of the National Trails System Act 40 years ago. Our goal is also to develop a comprehensive administrative history to document how the System was born and how it has evolved since. From that we hope to help someone craft an anniversary book (well illustrated, of course) that will be published in early 2008. If we’re lucky, we can declare the period 2008 to 2018 "The Decade of the Trail." These anniversaries dovetail neatly with the Centennial anniversary of the entire National Park Service in 2016.
Smith: How have you taken advantage of this in terms of promoting the National Trails System?
Elkinton: The commemoration of the Trail System’s 40th and 50th anniversaries will be a failure if it only reaches trail advocates and supporters. Yes, it is important to engage all who work on these trails and celebrate their collective accomplishments, but these anniversaries provide an unparalleled opportunity to inform the American public about the National Trails System that was created for its benefit decades ago. The anniversary will be a success if new folks get involved in the national trails, if membership numbers grow of the nonprofit groups that organize volunteers who help operate the trails, and if public awareness about the National Trails System (very hard to measure) increases in some demonstrable way.
Smith: With an increasing ability to make people aware of trails, has interest increased?
Elkinton: One way I know people are discovering and coming to love national trails is that more and more proposals are introduced for new trails. Just during the 109th Congress (2005-2006), bills were introduced to study seven proposed trails and establish four new trails. As the system becomes better marked and people become familiar with trail segments in or near their communities, some become curious about where that route leads, and they follow it. There have been only a few books written, or TV and radio shows produced, featuring the individual trails or the National Trails System as a whole. Even so, through word of mouth, popular (even international) interest in America’s national trails increases every year.
Smith: How do you measure increased interest/success in promoting the National Trails System (e.g. more people joining hiking clubs, more requests for information, etc)? I can think that one yardstick would be the number of people hiking a given trail, but isn’t that hard to measure?
Elkinton: All of the measurements to assess trail progress are difficult due to the dispersed nature of the resources and the multiple jurisdictions to which the trails belong. This is especially true of use statistics. I don’t know of any reliable numbers measuring how many people hike a given trail over a period of time – let alone for an entire interstate trail. Figures for historic trails are even more fragmentary.
My favorite indicator is the number hours offered each year by volunteers assisting with national scenic and historic trails. These figures are assembled by the Partnership for the National Trails System, based in Madison, WI. In 1996, all NST and NHT volunteers contributed 473,100 hours; in 2005 they contributed 723,200 hours, a 52% increase over 10 years! Of course in 1996 there were only 20 national trails – now there are 25. This increase in contributed hours was paralleled by an increase of contributed funds.
