State House delegation visits, surveys Nashua River Rail Trail conditions
Shane Rhodes | Sentinel & Enterprise | November 26, 2022
GROTON — State Sens. Jamie Eldridge and Ed Kennedy made their way to Groton last Friday to survey the current state of the Nashua River Rail Trail.
The Nov. 18 site visit, which also included representatives of state Sen. John Cronin and state Rep. Dan Sena’s offices, came in response to a letter penned by Peter Cunningham, a member of the Groton Select Board and the Friends of the Nashua River Rail Trail, back in August that described the condition of the “vital recreational resource” as “deteriorated.”
Managed by the state’s Department of Conservation and Recreation, Cunningham recently said he felt the NRRT had been neglected by the agency.
That said, he called Friday’s visit “huge” for the future of the trail.
“Obviously (a visit by the legislators) can help us raise awareness, but I think it can also help (the legislators) back on Beacon Hill when they need to sort of articulate what we’re dealing with,” Cunningham said. “You can be somewhere, you can read a letter and maybe understand at a certain level, but seeing the condition of the trail firsthand like they have today can really make a difference.”
“Having (state) Sen. Eldridge and (state) Sen. Kennedy here, that’s huge, it’s all a part of that process and, hopefully, it’s just the beginning,” he said.
Through constant use, the trail has become inundated with potholes and other markings. Likewise, weather, rocks and roots have cracked parts of the trail and, in some areas, even broken through the surface of the pavement from underneath, leading to large mounds in the asphalt that the FNRRT refer to as “volcanoes.”
After they walked a section of the trail, Eldridge and Kennedy both called for a complete “rebuild” of the trail by DCR and said the pockmarked surface could pose a safety risk to those that continue to use the trail.
“This is one of the oldest rail trails in the state and has seen more and more people use it every day,” Eldridge said. “So I think, now, it’s time for DCR to not just patch certain sections, but commit to a plan to fully rebuild and replace the entire Nashua River Rail Trail.”
“It’s bad — the trail is more than 20 years old at this point and, I know some areas have been fixed up, but it really needs a total overhaul,” Kennedy said. “Anybody that’s walked that trail, that’s seen the damage, it’s evident that it’s a safety concern for people and it’s something I would like to see addressed by DCR with greater emphasis.”
While Eldridge said he did not expect “significant” action from DCR until Maura Healey is sworn in as Massachusetts’ next governor in January, he hoped to develop some sort of plan for the NRRT moving forward alongside the agency and other local legislators. He also stressed that funding for such a plan is already available.
“Obviously, a funding decision might not happen until the (Healey) administration is in place, but I think we can and should begin working on a plan now,” he said. “Clearly, any plan to address the (Nashua River Rail) trail will have to be comprehensive, so getting a jump start on that now could go a long way.”
“It’s also important to emphasize to DCR that these funds are there, we have ARPA money, federal infrastructure money and other funds thanks to the congressional delegation. So if (funds) are what DCR needs to (rebuild the trail), I think local, state and federal elected officials have to work together to make that clear to (DCR),” he said.
Cunningham said he hoped to see a renewed commitment to the NRRT by DCR in the near future and noted that the agency has enacted similar efforts for other rail trails across the state.
“It has been done elsewhere, it’s not some black magic,” Cunningham said. “A whole rebuild of the trail is what really needs to happen here — and I would love to see that, so hopefully (DCR and the state Legislature) can work together to make that happen.”
Going forward, Eldridge, Kennedy and Cunningham called for continued and “robust” advocacy for the trail by local constituents to ensure the state Legislature and those at DCR know that the NRRT is a “priority.”
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