Promoting Yorktown Through its Walking, Biking, Hiking Trails

In a recent presentation to the Town Board, Yorktown resident Mark Linehan and Yorktown Heights businessman David Goldes (Rita’s of Yorktown), co-chairs of the community-based Yorktown Trail Town Committee, unveiled the group’s first completed project: a commissioned map of the North County Trailway as it passes through the Yorktown Heights hamlet.

The tourist-style map is designed to encourage trail users to take advantage of the many shops, restaurants, and services available to them as they enter Yorktown at Railroad Park.

The map is the first in a series of planned initiatives to promote Yorktown as a trail town and use the town’s many walking, biking, and hiking trails as an opportunity for local economic development. The trail town concept has been successful in drawing visitors into downtown areas in many parts of the county.

As explained by Linehan, the Yorktown Heights map will be the focus of a new brochure, The North County Trailway at Yorktown Heights that will be available the first week of June. Funded by ads and donations, copies of the free brochure will be available at local businesses in the Heights hamlet and at other locations likely to attract visitors to Yorktown. In addition to promoting the Trailway, the brochure is designed to invite visitors to explore Yorktown’s other trails, parks, and farms.

The Committee is also in the process of raising funds by donations and grants to erect two permanent Welcome to Yorktown Heights gateway signs featuring the Trailway map at the north and sound ends of Railroad Park.

“Trail users spend money,” Linehan told the Town Board, “whether it’s for an ice cream cone or a sit down meal, to service their bikes or do some shopping. And what better place for visitors using the North County Trailway to spend their money than in the Heights hamlet, the only commercial area along the Trailway between Millwood and Baldwin Place.”

According to a county study, visitors to the North County Trailway spend an average of $11 per trip on food and use the trail an average of 78 times a year.

“Even if only 10% of Trailway visits bring business to the Heights, that’s additional money coming into our local economy,” Linehan said.

The Yorktown Trail Town Committee was organized last September with the goal of promoting economic development by making Yorktown a destination for hikers, cyclists, walkers, and nature enthusiasts. The Committee is currently working on a series of additional trail promotion initiatives involving other sections of Yorktown.

One project will be posting specially designed “What’s Nearby” signs at five trail kiosks so that hikers have an idea of what services, such as food, gas stations and auto repair shops are available near the trails. The signs are being designed by Kim Kroupa, a senior at Yorktown High School, as part of a civic internship program with the New York/New Jersey Trail Conference.

“The goal of the “What’s Nearby” signs is promoting our local businesses,” explained Jane Daniels, a member of the Yorktown Trail Town Committee. Using the kiosk at the end of the Sylvan Glen Park Preserve as an example, Daniels said that first-time visitors to Yorktown are not likely to know about the many shops and services along Route 202.

The Yorktown Trail Town Committee is also planning a series of guided special events June 6 as part of National Trail Day, including:

• For hikers, a hike up Turkey Mountain
• For cyclists, a ride along the Trailway from Yorktown to Millwood and back
• For nature lovers, a bird walk along the North County Trailway

The events will start from Railroad Park at 1:30 pm, with a reception following at Trail Side Café on Commerce Street, directly across from the North County Trail. For more details, check the Committee’s web site.

The Yorktown Trail Town Committee is an all-volunteer, nonprofit, nonpartisan group composed of local business owners and residents. Membership is open to all.

For information about the Committee, and to make a donation to help finance the permanent Welcome signs on the North County Trailway, please visit www.yorktowntrailtown.com or send an email to yorktowntrailtown@gmail.com.

The design of the creative materials, including the map, the brochure and the gateway Welcome sign were carried out, pro bono, by VOX, Inc., a local marketing firm that has promoted other trail town initiatives in the Hudson Valley.

--From the Yorktown Trail Town Committee

MAP/screenshot from YTTC presentation