Pennsylvania Is Looking for a Few Good Trail People, and Confluence Knows a Few
DCNR is taking applications this fall for its 20-member Trails Advisory Committee. Here's what the job involves and why someone from the GAP corridor ought to apply.
The Pennsylvania Department of Conservation and Natural Resources is taking applications this fall for its Trails Advisory Committee, the 20-member volunteer board that helps decide how the state spends its trail money. If you’ve ever hauled gravel on the GAP, argued about e-bike access at a trailhead, or sat through a township meeting about ATVs, DCNR would like to hear from you.
It’s a three-year term, unpaid, and not a small ask: about four meetings a year, an in-person gathering each June and a virtual one in December, plus a seat on at least one subcommittee. Members review the trail grant applications that come through every year, vote on the Pennsylvania Trail of the Year, and turn up at trail conferences and events when they can.
DCNR tries to balance the committee between motorized and non-motorized trail users and cover the state geographically, and that second part is where this corner of Pennsylvania has an argument to make. Confluence sits at mile 61.6 of the Great Allegheny Passage, between Rockwood and Ohiopyle, in a county where the Somerset County Rails to Trails Association spent decades building the 41 miles of GAP that run through here. Between the trail towns, the outfitters, and everybody who has ever untangled a downed tree off a bike path themselves, this region has more informed opinions about trails per capita than most.
To apply, send a letter of interest and a resume to RA-explorepatrails@pa.gov. DCNR doesn’t post a hard deadline beyond “this fall,” so don’t wait until the leaves are down to get your name in.
Nobody knows a trail’s blind spots like the people who ride it, hike it, and fix it when it washes out. Harrisburg is asking. Might as well answer.