Trail Towns 101: Strategies, Tools and Inspiration to Make Trails Work for Your Community

In Session 1: Fundamentals, you'll dive into what it means to be a trail town, explore the development of trail towns across the nation, and learn how communities are leveraging their trails for substantial impact. We’ll address common challenges, debunk myths, and equip you with participatory tools for engaging your community and building momentum.

Session 2: Building Your Trail Town Identity focuses on linking your trail with your town through strategic methods. You’ll learn to cultivate a distinctive trail culture, identify and fill hospitality gaps, and understand your market better. Discover how to tell your community’s unique stories and develop a grassroots marketing strategy that can grow trail use among locals and turn them into your strongest advocates.

In Session 3: Sustaining Your Trail Town, you’ll explore strategies to build and maintain memorable trail and town experiences. This session delves into supporting local economies, ensuring trail stewardship, managing visitor experiences, and becoming a recognized trail destination. We’ll also cover funding opportunities, progress tracking, and celebrating successes to maintain long-term momentum.

Trail Towns 101 is back!
More than two dozen participants joined the first Trail Towns 101 course this spring, hailing from trails and communities across the U.S. and Canada. We’ve tweaked the course in response to their feedback—including building in more time for developing relationships and learning from other trail communities—and are excited to offer it again this summer!

Good words from participants
“The course was packed with information. I'm still creating a plan to utilize the information to partner with the community and the trail for local support, participation, and engagement. Thank you!”

“As a newbie to the whole trail concept, this course broke down the essential part to build upon. Created a direct purpose for tourism in trails and how we can help foster, and generate a purposeful direction in our county.”

“The course was dense with tons of information and resources around every corner. This was super valuable and also a bit like drinking out of a firehose! (I would do it again though).”

Finally, in the optional Trail Town Assessment Accelerator, you’ll learn more about how to use a 2-3 hour walking or “bike-around” assessment to engage your community, boost enthusiasm, and generate insights to guide your path toward becoming a more trail-friendly community. This session will help you plan for your own assessment, which you can do this fall or any time it fits!

Join us on this journey to create vibrant, trail-centric communities. Trail Towns 101 will help you take the next steps toward unlocking the full potential of your local trails.

Location

This is a virtual training. See the event website for more details.

Trail Competencies

Relevant Trail Types

• Accessible Trails
• Bicycling Trails
• Hiking Trails
• Long-distance Trails
• Mountain Biking Trails
• Motorized Trails
• Rail-Trails
• Shared-Use Trails
• Urban Trails