The Mountain Division trail holds the promise of becoming an important commuter route for cyclists traveling from the western suburbs to Greater Portland.

As gas prices approach $4 a gallon, bicycle commuting offers the opportunity to save a lot of money while improving one’s health and reducing traffic and pollution.

Your March 5 editorial, “Rail project should take precedence over trail,” ignores this use of the Mountain Division trail. You refer repeatedly to “recreational users” and ignore those who use the trail as a transportation route to get to work, stores and other destinations.

Your editorial also ignores the significant economic impact of recreational trails. A 2009 survey by the Rails-to-Trails Conservancy Northeast Regional Office found that users of seven Pennsylvania trails spent, on average, between $2 (local users) and $33 (non-local users). Bicycling was the most popular activity on the trails.

A 2006 survey by the same organization found that users of a 63-mile trail in Pennsylvania spent, on average, $30 per trail visit on “soft goods” such as food and $69 per night on accommodations (for an average of 3.34 nights).

Anyone who has visited the bicycle trails on Cape Cod knows that they’ve led to the opening of dozens of ice cream shops, bicycle shops and other businesses. Communities in two Maine counties — Washington and Hancock — realized early on that the new, 85-mile Down East Sunrise Trail can be an economic boon to their area and they started planning accordingly.

Your editorial states, “If the state has to choose, our transportation and economic needs should take priority over our recreational wants — it’s not even a close call.” In fact, both our economy and our transportation system will benefit from creating a trail from Portland to New Hampshire alongside the rail line.

 

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