Trails prepping for bridgework, lessons on bridgework

The Norwood Trails Advisory Committee (NTAC) met last week and has several discussions focused on water crossings in the Town’s Trail system.

NTAC member Joseph Barrett said they are planning on installing more water crossings across Norwood’s Trails. He said they’re aiming to install two new crossings on the weekend of July 25 at the University Avenue trails, which, when all the work is done, will create a five-plus-mile trail around the Norwood Memorial Airport from the Norwood Animal Control Building on Route 1 (just south of the Everett/University/Route 1 intersection) to the Meadow Street Trail entrance.

Barrett said the first trail will be easier.

“I’m going to target that weekend for moving the stuff to the conservation stream in the woods,” he said. “It’s a one-day move and it’s a one-day build – we could build it the next day. But it all depends on whether it’s raining, whether people around, and whether we have the equipment to transport it. I was hoping to do it this weekend, but that’s not going to work out.”

Barrett said the lumber for the two bridges was delivered and dropped off last week, and he said they’ve already done all the necessary cutting for installation.

“All the pre-cutting is done,” he said. “So it will be moving the bridge materials one day, install the next day.”

The second bridge on the list, however, will need a lot more hard work, as the trailhead is about a mile from the work site and is unreachable with vehicles.

“That one’s going to be a nightmare,” Barrett said. “That’s going to require a lot of carrying over a half-mile, and that’s assuming we can drive it in the first half-mile. That won’t happen before August if we’re lucky, but if it gets more buggy, we’ll just wait until the temperature drops and we’ll see what the conditions are. Rain will dictate everything.”

The next two bridges going through the permitting process are in the Norwood Pine Tree Forest, through the Meadow Street Trail.

Barrett said they have taken care of some maintenance on an existing crossing near the Norwood Memorial Airport, in which, because of flooding this year, parts of the crossing were becoming loose and unsafe.

“They were there for months and floating, and so we got some anchor bolts and finger washers to just hold them in place,” he said.

Barrett also went over the work/maintenance numbers for the trails overall, and he said the team recorded 56.5 day hours and 126 person hours. So that’s 56.5 total hours’ works over the course of the month, times how many people participated equals 126 person hours.

“So far in July, there have been 25 day hours and 45 person hours,” he said.

Barrett said they’ve hit all the trails but three.

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“The red trail at Vanderbilt, from the Skating Club to the Car Dealership (at University Avenue), and Ledgeview,” he said. “But all the main trails have been done at least once and most of them, twice.”

For trail maps, go to https://gvimes.link/trlsmps

Also at the meeting, the NTAC discussed member Francis “Gerry” Hopcroft’s upcoming talk at the Norwood Morrill Memorial Library on Aug. 11 at 6 p.m. The presentation will focus on the committee’s efforts thus far and Hopcroft’s manual, which he wrote to standardize the many water crossings around the Trails system the NTAC is building after getting $200,000 from the Community Preservation Act Fund through Town Meeting.

The presentation will focus on the work at Vanderbilt and Meadow Street. The work has resulted in the effective doubling of year-round trail access on those two sites (at least for hikers who don’t want to wear waders on the trail).

For more information on the upcoming talk, go to https://gvimes.link/xingmanual

For more information on the NTAC and the Town’s trails, go to https://gvimes.link/trailshome