build and network public trails
ITC Members
Iowa
Trail News:
ITC negotiates for
five more rail-trails
Iowa
Trails Council
Post
Office Box 131
Center
Point IA 52213-0131
Telephone 319-849-1844
Foggy
fall run on
Cedar
Valley Nature Trail
| The
Iowa Trails Council (ITC) was formed in 1984, within a year after the passage
by Congress of an amendment to the National Trails System Act, which provided
for the "banking" of certain abandoned railroad rights-of-way.
Founders of the ITC were inspired by this law which provided for the preservation of these rights-of-way by establishing trails within the corridors. Prior to 1984, founders of the ITC had been instrumental in creating two of the earliest rail-trails in the nation: the 52-mile Cedar Valley Nature Trail and the 26-mile Heritage Trail. At that time, the CVNT was the longest rail-trail in the nation and the first to connect two metro areas. This was several years before any national rail-trail organization had been formed. The difficulties encountered in establishing those two trails steeled the ITC leadership for what was to come. Their efforts were not without opposition. Rural residents believed that these rail corridors should be reattached to their land once abandonment had taken place. Because Iowa is largely an agricultural state it had many rail lines crisscrossing the state that were gradually being replaced by highway transportation. The U.S. Department of Transportation was slow to set the procedural rules for "banking" of these corridors under the law Congress had passed. The ITC, in its early efforts to create more of these narrow parkways, helped the U S DOT to formulate its rules, learning the best means of accomplishing the end Congress intended, together. The ITC was able to establish the first-in-the-nation rail-trail conversion under the federal legislation in Carroll County. This law was challenged in the courts and eventually reached the US Supreme Court on appeal. There it was unanimously affirmed as constitutional. From the first hearing in 1985 until the U.S. Supreme Court reviewed the case in 1990, the ITC established 11 rail trails under the 1983 law. There were only two others established in that same period in all of the other 49 states. Today Iowa continues as a rail-trail leader with over 700 miles of such trails constructed or under development in more than 50 projects. A great effort is being made to continue acquisitions and to connect these into an across-the-state system. This effort includes off-road connections for completing the coast-to-coast American Discovery Trail through Iowa. |