Vermont trail conservancy organizations are dealing with a major surge this summer.
Trail use at some popular day hike locations has about doubled year-over-year, estimated Keegan Tierney, director of field programs at the Green Mountain Club. On the Long Trail, he estimates there’s been a 35% increase in hikers this year.
And these numbers aren’t just due to a dropoff in trail use last summer, when the pandemic was more severe.
“We definitely saw a Covid bump because the outdoors was a safe place for people to be,” Tierney said. “And then in general, trail usage has been on a steady increase year-over-year for the past decade.”
Overuse of a trail can cause problems — erosion, which can kill surrounding plant life and lead to excessive water runoff; bear activity, as the animals are drawn by the food being consumed in the woods; and crowds around trailheads, which kind of defeats the purpose of a long walk in the woods.
Morgan Sommerville, director of visitor use management at the Appalachian Trail Conservancy, described trends in trail use as “kind of a sine curve.”
“Back in the ’70s, there was a huge increase in people using outdoor recreation and that slacked off slowly,” he said. “And then for the AT, a significant increase came back in the late ’90s.”
Sommerville said the number of thru-hikers attempting long treks like the Appalachian Trail is largely influenced by representations of hiking in pop culture.
He recalled a significant increase in AT hikers in 1998 and 1999, soon after the release of Bill Bryson’s best-selling memoir “A Walk in the Woods.” In 2005, when Robert Redford announced he would produce and star in a film adaptation, the Appalachian Trail Conservancy immediately prepared for a new influx of backpackers and increased campsite capacity.
“I think much of it was successful, but I don’t think we anticipated that use would just keep on rising,” Sommerville said.
Sommerville estimated overall use of the Appalachian Trail has increased about 10% a year since 2007. Reese Witherspoon’s 2014 movie “Wild,” based on Cheryl Strayed’s memoir of hiking the Pacific Crest Trail, also inspired a measurable uptick in AT thru-hike attempts.
For Vermont specifically, more hikers has meant more concerns about bears.
“We haven’t historically had the issues that they have in the Adirondacks and Smokies, but we are seeing an increasing trend in bear-human interactions,” Tierney said. “Folks, if they’re going to spend the night out in the field, really need to educate themselves on proper food storage.”
The Green Mountain Club expects some of Vermont’s most popular day hikes to be especially crowded this holiday weekend, and has recommended some alternatives to the most popular routes:
- Butler Lodge Loop (4.5 miles roundtrip; 1,700-foot elevation gain) as an alternative to Mount Mansfield (5 miles roundtrip; 2,793-foot elevation gain)
- Beaver Meadow Loop (7.9 miles roundtrip; 1,472-foot elevation gain) as an alternative to Camel’s Hump (4.8 miles roundtrip; 2,280-foot elevation gain)
- Branch Pond Trail (8.6 miles roundtrip; 407-foot elevation gain) as an alternative to Stratton Pond (7.4 miles roundtrip; 363-foot elevation gain)
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Organizations hope to get hikers interested in less popular Vermont trails - vtdigger.org
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