KICK-OFF SESSION | MASS CENTRAL RAIL TRAIL
MAKING CONNECTIONS
The Mass Central Rail Trail represents a cross-section of our state, our trails community, and MassTrails. It involves a rich history of our state’s evolution in transportation as well as the efforts of trail advocates across communities to enter the new age of Rail Trails, providing the myriad of economic, health, environmental, transportation, accessibility, and equity benefits which we know trails can offer to all residents and visitors in Massachusetts today. All trails need partnerships and community support to be successfully built and maintained. Today, we are shining a spotlight on the communities along the MCRT to hear their perspective and experiences as they help shape the future of the Commonwealth’s trail network. We hope that you will all come away with a sense of how every community along the MCRT, and the greater trails network of Massachusetts, are unique in their storyline, accomplishments, challenges, and future. We hope that today, and throughout the MassTrails Conference, we can help in inspiring all of us to work together to thread all of our trails and our efforts together. And, just as importantly, to invite all people in Massachusetts to feel a sense of belonging on these trails that we are all working so hard to build and share with others!
Please join us for the 2024 MassTrails Conference Virtual Kick-Off! MassTrails team members will set the stage for the week-long conference and all its offerings to the Massachusetts trails community. Then, the session will turn its focus to the pivotal and extraordinary work going on in communities along the Mass Central Rail Trail corridor. We will hear from four leaders in the MCRT effort who are working to plan, design, build, and maintain the corridor within four diverse and critical sections of the trail, leveraging and pushing resources within their community to create connections across the Commonwealth. When completed the MCRT will be the longest rail trail in New England, connecting 26 cities and towns…and beyond!
Welcome: AMANDA LEWIS and ELI VELLUTI-FRY, MA DCR - MassTrails
CYNTHIA HENSHAW, East Quabbin Land Trust; COLLEEN ABRAMS, Wachusett Greenways; PHIL DUFFY, Town of Clinton; GLENN PRANSKY, Sudbury Rail Trail Advisory Committee; CRAIG DELLA PENNA, Norwottuck Network.
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