Green Mountain Trail Collaborative Stewardship and Communication Work Group Meeting Notes June 30, 2010

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1 Date: Time: 12:30-1:30 Location: Phone Conference Facilitator: Brian D. Cotterill Note Taker: Brian D. Cotterill Committee Members in Attendance: Danny Hale Doug Webber Sherry Winnie Alexis Nelson Craig Whipple Mark Maghini VASA, VTGC VORA FPR VAST FPR (input via ) FWS Action items from previous meeting: 1. (Brian) Lead effort to invite additional members to committee to ensure full trail user group representation. a. VRPA is searching for a representative for the workgroup. b. VIMBA executive director has agreed to help get the workgroups survey out to VIMBA members. 2. (Jessica) Lead effort to draft a survey the group can use to capture data from various segments of stakeholders. a. First draft of survey is complete. See notes below. 3. (All) Register as a member of the work group by going to a. Members are populating the Google Group, it is now up to 19. Meeting Agenda for 6/30: Review draft survey questions. and suggestions for improving the survey. The following is the overview to be included in an with the survey Thank you for your participation in this survey. This is a project of the Vermont Trail Collaborative s Stewardship and Communication Work Group and is part of a two year long public process initiated by the Green Mountain National Forest and the Vermont Department of Forests, Parks and Recreation. Your participation is part of a public process designed to identify recreation needs and improve management of trails and recreation resources in Vermont's Green Mountain National Forest and all surrounding publicly accessible areas.

2 The Vermont Trail Collaborative and the Vermont Trails & Greenways Council are sponsoring the survey with the purpose of generating stakeholder data, comments and input on the sustainability of Vermont s trail resources. A successful survey process will inform a trail safety and education messaging campaign aimed at branding a Universal Trail-Use Ethic in Vermont applicable to all currently allowable trail uses. Survey results will also serve as a mechanism to capture the voice of Vermont s trail users with regards to what is working and what could be better when it comes to creating, maintaining and using public trails in Vermont. Thank you for your input. This survey will be open until July 30. Please direct any questions to Brian Cotterill at bdcotterill@gmail.com. on overview Include a section on if/how survey will be used in SCORP. Mention Vermont s Trail Plan in the opening (which is part of SCORP). Question about if/how OHV groups should participate in the survey and process as a whole. Important to define Universal Trail Ethic Consensus leaning towards this being a set of common set of trail user behavior expectations regardless of landownership. Question 1 What is your preferred mode of trail recreation? Motorized Non-motorized Does it matter for this survey? What if respondents prefer both? This is a dividing question right at the start. Consensus to eliminate the question for now. Question 2 What trail user group do you identify with most? Snowmobile Snowshoe/ Ski All Terrain Vehicle Equestrian Hiking Mountain Bike Paddling Rock Climbing Urban, Bike/ Pedestrian

3 Have ability to pick more than one question here. Maybe limit to top three? Change ATV to OHV. Split out Snowshoe and Ski. Reword to ask what forms of trail use do you participate in? Question 3 Rank the trail resources at stake for your user group. Access Trail Infrastructure Protecting Private Property Volunteers Paid Staff Funding Trail Supply and Demand Management Tools Reducing Conflict Change access to allowable access. Gear all options to fit the user perspective (some of these are geared towards the land managers perspective which confuses the question). Add trail condition as an option. Add conflict with similar/ other uses. Think about changing question to read, What are the trail resources at stake for the use and continued enjoyment of your preferred trail activity? Question 4 What message will a Universal Trail Ethic communicate to ensure user safety and reduce user conflict? This is an open-ended question where survey respondents have the opportunity to answer in there own words. Suggestion to reword to If Vermont had a Universal Trail Ethic what would it communicate? Question 5 Once a Universal Trail Ethic has been established, what is the best way to reach and communicate the message to users? Trail-head Kiosks On-Trail Promotion WWW Membership Campaign

4 Tourism Centers Chambers of Commerce Gear Shops and Recreation Hubs Radio Sound Bite TV Advertisement This is great, no changes. Question 6 Over the long term, what are the most important things to measure to gauge the success of a Universal Trail Ethic in Vermont? Emergency Response Reports Injury Reports User Conflict Reports Damage Reports Rogue-Use Reports Environmental Impact Reports Overall too much reference to Reports Overall to many negative choice options. Add Satisfaction of recreational experience. Add Trails are in good and usable condition or Condition of trails. Reword or eliminate Damage reports. Combine Conflict and Rogue into one question/ option. Question 7 How would a Universal Trail Ethic benefit your user group? This is an open-ended question where survey respondents have the opportunity to answer in there own words. None. Seems good as it is. Question 8 What resources might you be willing to contribute to establishing a Universal Trail Ethic for Vermont? Volunteerism Education Time Monitoring Time Organizational Resources Modest Financial Contribution Change wording to establish and maintain a Universal Trail Ethic. Take out Organizational Resources.

5 Add Other as final option Action Ongoing Brain Reaching out to regional trail groups to get trail summit and eventual survey participation Survey team Will strive to have second version of survey by July meeting with the intention of working through additional ideas on the process for distributing it to interest and user groups. After that, the next step will be to ask the Trail Collaborative community to take the survey and ask for feedback at the same time. Brian to reach out to the non-trail user group members of the Trail Collaborative to participate in Trail Summits (per 7/9 Steering Committee Meeting).