Mass Central Rail Trail

There will be two guided tours.  One a walking tour and one by bike.  The walking tour will be led by Friends of Northampton Trails and Greenways board member, Susan Voss, Ph.D.

Susan is an Assistant Professor of Engineering at Smith College's Picker School of Engineering. [the first women's engineering school in the U.S.]  Susan's Bio is here. Her tour will cover the existing and soon to be built connections through downtown Northampton. 

Themes covered and notable things seen will be:  
1. The on-going brownfield remediation project at the site of the old Northampton Gas Light Co. and the coal yard once located there.
2. The soon to be constructed trail that goes past the Smith College power plant. This used to run on coal, and most recently its three boilers have been powered by natural gas, but it is currently undergoing renovation to now run two of the three boilers on used vegetable oil.  Gary Hartwell, project manager of the conversion project for Smith College has agreed to meet the walk participants at the power plant and give a brief talk about what they are doing. Gary is a great source of info on sustainability projects of all sizes--big and small.
3. A walk past the architecturally significant Union Station and the Wm. Nagle Walkway built on the New Haven Railroad's right of way--and part of the former railroad corridor now being developed all the way to New Haven CT.

This walking tour will start at 3:00 p.m. sharp and kick-off from the Northampton Brewery's Hampton Avenue side. [near the major surface city parking lot--and near the incredibly cheap city parking garage.] Directions here. The city's parking czar Bill Letendre has a great site about parking in downtown and a printable PDF map too. 

The biking tour will start at the Sugar Maple Trailside Inn in Northampton's village of Florence.  This is located at 62 Chestnut Street-- 2 miles west of downtown Northampton on Route 9.  Exact directions to SMTI can be found here. Or a MapQuest map can be found at this link. The tour guide will be Craig Della Penna. Bio here. 

The tour will kick-off at 3:00 p.m. sharp. 

This ride will start at Sugar Maple Trailside Inn and head east on the City of Northampton Bikeway--the oldest municipally built rail trail in New England--through the edge of Stop and Shop parking lot, cross Rt 5 and then head onto the soon to be opened, newly built extension of the Norwottuck Trail.

We will then head into downtown Northampton for a tour of future rail trail connections. The educational component at various points along the will include:

1. The theory of remaking streets into places more attractive for bikes and pedestrians and why you'll see bikes everyday of the year in Northampton.

2. Design of rail trails and how this practice has change since this trail was built almost 25 years ago.

3. A short history of downtown Northampton—one of a “Dozen Distinctive Destinations” in the U.S. [as noted by the National Trust for Historic Preservation] and the "#1 shopping district in Massachusetts" [as noted by the Massachusetts Retailers Association]. We'll also discuss why this community is the number one place in the U.S. to retire--as noted by "Best Places" author, Bert Sperling.

4. Visit the "Stonehenge of Florence", talk about the railroad history of the area, uncover the meaning of various bits of railroad archaeology along the path and once downtown, we'll visit the long diverted Mill River and the plans to bring it back into downtown Northampton--in a controlled fashion like in Providence, RI.

6. Stand at the intersection where the longest rail trail in New England [the MassCentral Rail Trail] and the longest INTERSTATE rail trail [the New Haven to Northampton Rail Trail]  -- both come together.

7. For those of you coming from areas where the idea of a rail trail is a controversial idea, we'll touch on all the hot button issues that were called forward here-- a generation ago when this path was first proposed. We'll look at how those were resolved and point out issues that will be useful back home in your debate. We are also trying to get one of the command officers of the NPD to come and chat about their real life experiences with the rail trail.

You will leave Northampton, refreshed, energized and will take back scores of ideas and memories that will be invaluable back home--whether your trail is built yet or not.

1. To participate, you are not locked into coming on a tour.  You can just come for dinner if you choose.
2. Conversely if you just come on one of the tours, you are not required to come to dinner. 
3. You must RSVP to let us know your choices. If you are coming on a tour, which one, if you are having dinner--and your entre choice.
4. RSVPs must be via email to: Craig4135@comcast.net
5. We have to have a final count on people coming to the restaurant by Thursday July 19th.  PLEASE RSVP by then.
6. The charges to participants coming to the restaurent will be a flat $10--except for the cost of beverages. Part of the cost is being underwritten by Northeast Greenway Solutions and Sugar Maple Trailside Inn.
7. It should also be noted that those coming to the Brewery by bike from Sugar Maple Trailside Inn will be biking back to Sugar Maple Trailside Inn after dinner.  This is about 2.5 miles away--on a direct route.