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Resources and Library:
Rails to Trails
Hosted by AmericanTrails.org
Projects
involving the conversion of abandoned
railroad rights of way to trails
and greenways;
design, management,
legal issues, planning, rails
with trails, and rail trail projects
from across America:
- The Downeast
Trail Engineering Feasibility Study from
State of Maine, Dept. of Transportation - Reconnecting
Communities: Atlanta Rail Corridor
Assessment, 2004 (pdf 3.4mb) - Building
the community into the trail: volunteer
development on the Baltimore & Annapolis Trail - Tunnels on trails: A Study of 78 Tunnels on 36 Trails in the United States
- Railroad rail-- should it be preserved on rail trails?
- Photos of rail trail facilities in Michigan
- Rail Trail Maintenance and Operation, 2005 (PDF 1.6 Mb)
- Study of two successful Canadian rural trails, one on an active irrigation canal alignment and the other converted from an abandoned rail line (pdf 123 kb)
- Analysis of the Economic Benefits of the Prairie Spirit Rail Trail (PDF 26 kb)
- Rail Trails and Public Safety, 1998 (PDF 284 kb)
- Rail Trails and Safe Communities, 1998 (PDF 2 Mb)
- Preventing illegal motorized use on non-motorized rail trails
- Equestrian use for Maybrook Rail Trail in Dutchess Co., NY
- Photos of trails crossing active railroads: http://mbreiding.us/rr_xing/
- CA: Projects underway in California
- CO: Options for Creede to South Fork rail line
- CO: Feasibility study for major Colorado rail-trail
- CO: Colorado rail line trail and tourist train proposed
- CO: Salida, Colorado, suports rail banking proposal
- CO: Possible rail trail may preserve Colorado's 178-mile Tennessee Pass rail line
- IA: Iowa: Out front on bike trail
- IL: New Chicago parks include elevated railtrail
- MI: Michigan's Kal-Haven Trail
- MO: Walking the Katy Trail across rural Missouri
- MO: Scenic stretch to finish new section of Katy Trail
- SD: George S. Mickelson Trail opens in South Dakota
- NE: Would Nebraska's Cowboy Line trail become nation's longest "Trail to Rail" Project
- NE: An overview of Nebraska's Cowboy Trail
- NE: Guide to the Cowboy Trail
- TX: Mineral Wells to Weatherford (pdf 127 kb)
- VA: High Bridge Trail features 2,400-foot long bridge
- WA: photos of Thompson Trail in Anacortes
- Belgium: Rail trail and greenway development in industrial city of Charleroi
- Twenty-five years of rail banking: a review and look ahead; hearings by Surface Transportation Board, July 8, 2009
- Judge rules Nebraska landowners are owed in rail trail suit
- Settlement allows Missouri to extend Katy Trail closer to KC on rail right of way
- Owners of properties along Legacy Trail (FL) could collect an estimated $40 million
- Judge dismisses lawsuit that held up Great Western Trail
- Old rail bridge would be the longest elevated pedestrian walkway in the world
The 960-foot-long
McDonald Trestle
carries the Montour
Trail over Robinson
Run Valley
(photo: Mary Shaw; all rights reserved)
- Will to succeed speeds Perkiomen Trail completion, Montgomery County, PA
- Missouri Blueways Project: Mapping and Developing Railtrails in Missouri
- Norfolk Southern works with Virginia to develop 285 miles of rail trails
- A Study of Opposition to Rail Trails and Strategies for Success (PDF 484 kb)
- Trails on Trial: the Rails-to-Trails Debate, 1997, from the Indiana Chapter of the Am. Society of Landscape Architects (PDF 4.9 mb)
- A Citizens Guide to Rail Trail Conversion (pdf 5.2 mb) by A.Wyeth Ruthven, Palmetto Conservation Foundation
- Successful Rail-Trails: An Acquisition and Organizing Manual from Rails to Trails Conservancy
- Integrating Rail-Trails into Statewide and Metropolitan Long Range Plans
- The federal Surface Transportation Board (STB) is responsible for railroad abandonments
- How railroad abandonments work from the STB
- Acquiring Rail Corridors: A How To Manual
- Reactivated Railbanked Corridors: rail trails returned to railroad service
- Railbanking and Railtrails: a legacy for the future (pdf 394kb)
- Railbanking: a primer on this essential legal tool for corridor preservation
- Sample letter requesting Public Use Condition and railbanking
- Basic text required for Public Use Condition and railbanking filing
- Analysis of rail corridor legal issues from trail opponents Natl Assn of Reversionary Property Owners
- Rails To Trails: are landowners railroaded? an insightful article by a rail trail opponent
- Prairie Spirit Rail Trail: state legal issues in Kansas
- Nebraska Board Blocks Bike Trail by Denying Permit and editorial reply, An Obstruction in Sarpy County
- Ohio bill would require fencing along planned and existing rail trails
- Court denies challenge to financial responsiblity of non-profit trail group (Kansas)
- Rail trails face another battle (Fall 1996 Trail Tracks)
- Rail trail problems in Indiana
- Outlining property rights of railroads
- Sample easements, licenses, and other agreements for trail rights-of-way
- Photos of rails with trails projects
- A Resolution Calling for Rails With Trails in Virginia
- Rails-with-Trails: Lessons Learned, Literature Review, Current Practices, Conclusions, U.S. DOT, FHWA
- Rails-with-Trails: A Preliminary Assessment of Safety and Grade Crossings, November 2005 (pdf 1.4mb)
- Rails-with-Trails Design, Management and Operating, 61 Trails Along Active Railroads (pdf 797kb), 2000
- Rails-With-Trails: A Progress Report, 1999
- Results of questionnaire on rails with trails safety survey, 1997
- Rails with trails: summary of safety workshop
- Can Trails Reduce Rail Trespass Fatalities?
- Sullivan's Gulch Trail Study (pdf 7.8mb) potential trail in a rail and transportation corridor, Portland, OR
- Plans for Rail-with-Trail facilities in Marin and Sonoma Counties (CA)
- San Diego Coastal Rail-Trail proposes a 44-mile trail along active railroad from San Diego to Oceanside
- Can Capital Crescent Trail and Purple Line Co-exist?: transit and trails possibilities on DC Metro system
- Rails and trails on the Aspen Branch in Colorado
- Trail proposed in MetroLink llight rail coridor, Illinois
- Rails AND trails: an idea whose time has come
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