Politics & Government
From Rail to Trail: Browns Creek May Open this Fall, DNR Seeks Public Input
The Minnesota Department of Natural Resources will hold the first public open house meeting on the Browns Creek Trail on Wednesday Oct. 19 at the Stillwater Public Library from 4:30 to 7:30 p.m.
Washington County and the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources have formed a partnership and may get the Browns Creek Trail segment open for walking this fall, so long as the weather cooperates.
The county board Tuesday morning authorized spending $1 million as a matching grant toward purchase of the former Zephyr train’s right-of-way to become a 5.9-mile trail.
Kent Skaar, DNR acquisition and development section lead for the parks and trails division, told the board the county’s $1 million will cover about 25 percent of the cost of buying the right-of-way. The state is covering the rest of the cost of the trail including removing the rails and ties and putting in a bridge over Manning Trail.
Find out what's happening in Stillwaterfor free with the latest updates from Patch.
Total cost of buying the land is more than $4.2 million, according to a county staff report.
The new segment of trail will be part of the Willard Munger Trail from St. Paul to Duluth. The Browns Creek segment will begin where the Gateway Trail ends in Grant and will go into Stillwater.
Find out what's happening in Stillwaterfor free with the latest updates from Patch.
Skaar said the new segment to Stillwater will probably have as much traffic as the Gateway does now and will bring economic benefits by connecting the communities on it. In the past, the DNR has estimated that the trail will bring as many as 300,000 users annually to Stillwater.
The money for the county’s share is coming from a $5 million bond sale a few years ago that was approved in a $20 million bond issue election in the county, said Jane Harper Washington County’s principle planner. About $3.5 million of that first bond has been spent so far on the county’s Land and Water Legacy Program, protecting wetlands, woodlands and other natural land, which includes park purposes.
Planning and engineering for the trail will be finished within the next two months, Skaar said after the meeting.
The ties and rails are scheduled to be removed late fall 2011 and the trail will be open for walking. The DNR will pave about 2 miles of trail in summer 2012 and will pave the remainder of the trail as development funds are secured.
The DNR will hold the first public open house meeting on the trail on Wednesday Oct. 19 at the from 4:30 to 7:30 p.m.
For more information on the Browns Creek State Trail visit the DNR’s project website.
