BOUNTIFUL–For the past eight years, a group of interested and motivated residents have volunteered countless hours as members of the Bountiful Trails Advisory Committee. They’ve created an extensive Trails Development Implementation Plan to serve as a guideline for development of new trails and improvement of existing ones in the community.

Those efforts are starting to bear fruit, boosted by $2 million from a voter-approved General Obligation Bond in 2020, and the recent receipt of a $500,000 matching grant from the Utah Office of Outdoor Recreation.

City Parks Director Brock Hill, along with assistant city engineer Todd Christensen and city planner Francisco Astorga, gave the Bountiful City Council an update on pending and planned trail projects. Some of them are set for completion before or near year’s end.

“Our outline as we’ve presented it here is a living, breathing, working document,” Hill said. “There will most likely be changes as we progress, but this is a timeline we’re working towards.” 

He said that some projects may move up the list (for timetables for completion) and others move down, as lots of components come into play when developing these trails. Weather, material costs and availability, and manpower (including volunteer labor) are all factors that can fluctuate.

Hill said the overall trail system for the community has been divided into six different areas, each having unique characteristics. Area 1, labeled “Urban,” is for those areas closest to the city, with established transportation corridors that make it easy to connect to residential and commercial areas. The priority of these trails is to provide easy connections to parks and open spaces and parking, and provide a place for a pump truck or bike park.

Eventually, trails would be developed from the new Washington Park to Creekside Park, Creekside Park to Mueller Park, Eggett Park to the Holbrook Trailhead, and Tolman Park (often called Rocket Park) to the “B” trailhead. These trails are on the Master Plan list but not yet given a specific priority or timeframe.

Among the other five areas are plans for trails from Hidden Lake to North Canyon, North Canyon to Mueller Park, Mueller to Holbrook, Holbrook to Ward, and what’s known as Buckland, the area near the “B” on the mountain.

“We’ve assigned each of the projects a priority designation, with what we’re calling ‘1a’ projects targeted to be completed this year,” Hill said. 

Those ‘1a’ projects include the trail from Holbrook Canyon to Ward Canyon and the Summerwood link to the Bonneville Shoreline Trail (set for July); trails from Elephant Rock for hiking and biking (August); Holbrook Bridge to connect the Holbrook and Ward trail to Holbrook Canyon and an extension from Elephant hiking/down to the trailhead (September), and the North Canyon Trailhead and a connection of Creekside to Davis Blvd. with a bridge (October). Again, all of these timetables are subject to change depending on circumstances.

“We’re excited about these projects, and we know there are many groups of hikers and mountain bikers who are anxious to see these come to fruition,” Hill said.  λ