Editor, Times-Union: Most non-motorized trails in recent years are “rails to trails,” on abandoned rail corridors. There are now over 1,000 of them in America, over 700 of which are paved. Having bicycled on more than 30 rail trails in 14 states, we observed nearly all prohibit horses.
The reasons are several. First, horses are too heavy for the paved surface. Secondly, trails are only ten or twelve feet wide, and it is too dangerous for walkers, joggers, bicyclists and inline skaters to be passing riders on horseback in such narrow confines, to say nothing of what horses leave behind at times.
Two trails come to mind that do have unpaved horse trails alongside a paved trail. One is the Pere Marquette Trail in Michigan, the other the Silver Comet Trail in the Atlanta area. Both of these trails have wide enough corridors to allow an equestrian trail to weave along the fringes of the trail right-of- way, and the terrain that makes it possible for a dirt horseback trail. Even with horses on an adjacent dirt trail alongside, the Silver Comet Trail’s rules require a brightly colored ribbon on the tails of stallions, which alerts rail trail users to beware as stallions are sometimes high spirited.
The Lake City trails certainly could not accommodate an equestrian trail alongside because there is not sufficient room. Connecting the two nice trails in the Warsaw area would be ideal if a relatively new phenomenon was utilized, called “rails with trails.” A chain link fence is erected to separate an active rail line, like the one going east and west through Warsaw, and a paved trail is built just on the other side of it within the rail corridor when an abandoned track is available.
In Kosciusko county, the only opportunity for a rail trail is the old interurban line that ran from Warsaw to Mentone. In neighboring Whitley County, is a developing rail trail between Columbia City and South Whitley called the Eel River Trail, on the abandoned Penn Central (Vandalia line) rail line, which may eventually connect to other trails in the region.
Rick Wagner Pierceton , via email Founder, Friends of Eel River Trail
