The Williston Conservation Commission is primarily responsible for the development and maintenance of the town’s primitive path network. The vision for this network of paths was largely formulated through a mapping exercise done in the late 1980’s, which resulted in a map of Desired Trails and Greenways, shown below. This map has guided the town’s acquisition of trail easements and development of trails ever since.
The Conservation Commission recently conducted an exercise to update this map of desired trails, utilizing assistance from a Plattsburgh State University Environmental Planning class. Various factors were considered including connectivity to existing trails and places of interest, geographic distribution of trails, environmental impacts, costs, feasibility, and regulatory constraints. Combining scoring for all factors resulted in a total score for each trail segment. All trail segments were mapped and symbolized according to final ranking. The result is an actionable list of desired trail segments that the WCC can reference in future years to acquire trail easements.
More information about this effort is available via the linked documents below.