Wednesday, November 29, 2017

The Nascent Rio Grande Trail Project

In an effort to design and build-out a statewide recreation trail with the vision and function of similar trails in neighboring states - i.e. The Colorado Trail, The Arizona Trail, Continental Divide Trail - state lawmakers established a Rio Grande Trail commission during the 2015 legislative session. The broad outline here would be for a multi-purpose rec trail running north-south along the Rio from Colorado to Texas.

There's a lot of private holdings in this alignment as well as significant Pueblo land throughout the valley so the expectation I'm guessing is that this will be a decades long effort which will likely have several gaps among long sections of contiguous trail over public land. This would still be a very favorable outcome compared with current status. The project also adjoins state and county resources to the small volunteer groups that build trail (generally mtb riders and hikers).

Currently there's a block of federal funding directed toward gathering public opinion, rec-user preferences, and other ideas for how people envision use of such a trail system as well as stuff that would add or detract from the trail experience. A very cool website has been setup for this purpose, a Virtual Open House, where you can read more about the RGT big picture and contribute your own ideas and opinion toward what this thing ought to look like. The ending date is December 11th.

Go there and add your voice to this beauty of a project.
Rio Grande Trail - Virtual Open House (until Dec 11, 2017)


Related Posts:
 - West Rim Trail - Taos, NM
 - Acequia Trail Underpass Groundbreaking
 - Bandelier National Monument and Lummis Canyon

Monday, November 20, 2017

UNM Lobos Top the NCAA XC Podium for a 2nd Time

Lobos champion 7; Prouse, Kurgat, Kelati, Buck, Casey,
Negròn Texidor, Wright
The UNM Women rolled to both the National NCAA XC team and individual titles this past weekend. Ednah Kurgat claimed the individual crown, All-American honors to the team's first four runners. The team title is the Lobo's 2nd in 3 years, and 3rd podium finish in the last 4 years, and collectively totals 8 top-ten finishes over the last 10 years.

The team was ranked 2nd going into championship weekend behind Colorado. The title hinged on the effort of their fifth scoring runner, Alondra Negròn Texidor, who crossed the line in 85th place securing the winning margin.

UNM Women's Cross Country Wins 2017 NCAA Title

1. UNM Lobos (ranked 2nd nationally): 90 points
2. San Francisco (ranked 3rd nationally): 105 pts
3. Colorado Buffs (top ranked): 139 pts



Related Posts:
 - Lobo Cross Country Continues Elite Run at NCAAs (Nov. '16)
 - New Mexico's Newest Olympic Hopeful (Jun. '16)
 - UNM Lobos Crushing It (Mar. 13)

Friday, November 10, 2017

Trail Access Finally Comes to Glorieta

Long talked about and now finally in motion, the Glorieta Camps trails (formerly the Baptist Conference Center) will soon be available to public access via a newly constructed trail routing around the Campus to the southeast.

Working in tandem with Glorieta Camps, Santa Fe County, and IMBA, the Santa Fe Fat Tire Society has the lead on this project and is asking for trail work volunteers as well as contributions to fund the work, setting a goal of $2,500 (nearly half funded as of Nov 10). - Contribute Here -

Continuing work on the access trail is scheduled for this Sun Nov 12, 9am SHARP at the Glorieta Camps main gate.
..."We'll be working on building more of the Glorieta Access trail. We got over 1/2 of the initial section built 2 weeks ago and will be working on the rest. We'll work until around noon, have some lunch, and then ride the great trails at GC. Another sunny day, with a high forecast for mid-50's. SFFTS will provide all the tools needed for the trail work."





A map of the Glorieta system via Strava heatmap. Glorieta Camps at the center there with various trails branching out and up. The orange route tracing a north-south boundary to the east is the road up to the fire lookout and to access the descents.



UPDATE: The funding for this trail project came through in a big way: $3,045 in total which exceeds the goal amount by +25% and was the top funded project of the 68 proposed projects of this year's IMBA Dig In campaign. Very well done to the good folks at SFFTSociety.


Related Posts:
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 - Santa Fe Watershed Assoc's new Arroyo Project
 - Local Outdoor Charitable Organizations Need Your Support


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