Donated photo
Trails designed for hiking and mountain biking use only will be developed by a professional trail designer. The management plan is to assure that trails at Rough Creek are sustainable, maintainable and protective of natural resources.
Canton OKs a plan to preserve Rough Creek
Senior staff writer
Aldermen approve trail system for hiking, mountain biking
CANTON — A plan was approved during a recent Canton aldermen meeting for a trail system for hiking and mountain biking in the Rough Creek Wilderness Preserve.
The management plan for the trail system is being coordinated by Marcia Tate, public health education director for the Haywood County Health Department, and Garrett Smathers, a consultant for the Town of Canton.
Their responsibility is to assure that current and future trails at Rough Creek are sustainable, maintainable and protective of the natural resources located in the watershed.
The trails, designed for hiking and mountain biking use only, will be developed by a professional trail designer, Tate said.
The project will be paid for through a $60,000 Walk and Roll grant from the state Healthy Fit Commission, she said.
“All of that grant is coming to Canton,” Tate said. “The first year we will be using $30,000, with most of that going to pave a walking and cycling trail at North Canton Elementary School.”
A portion of the grant, or $1,500, will be used to design the trail at the Rough Creek Wilderness Preserve, she said.
The second year of the grant, the entire remaining funds will go to prepare the trail, Tate said. The general public will be allowed to enter the preserve on established trails on existing logging roads, which will be restricted solely to foot and non-motorized bicycle traffic, she said.
As designed, there are about 10 miles of combined hiking and bicycling trails, with about two miles of that being for hiking use only.
Other allowable uses, according to the plan, will include picnicking. Camping, fishing and hunting will not be allowed.
Certain critical habitat protection zones will be reserved for natural heritage research and learning, Smathers said.
Woody King of Raleigh, author of Trail Solutions magazine, will design the Rough Creek trail system. The design should be ready by October, Tate said. Haywood Community College will work on mapping for the preserve, Smathers said.
“In the end we will have a very definitive plan for what we want to do at Rough Creek,” he said. “I can see it being used not only for hiking and biking, but also for educational purposes. But, we must be careful that one use does not conflict with another,” Smathers said.
“We must be careful that we don’t destroy the very thing we are trying to protect,” he said.
The town of Canton bought the watershed in the early 1900s, but stopped using it as its drinking water source in 1996, when new state and federal regulations would have proven too costly for the town to continue using the watershed.
The Rough Creek Watershed was certified in 1997 as an N.C. Registered Natural Heritage Area because of an unusual swamp forest-bog complex. Rough Creek is classified as a WS-1, the highest, most pristine water quality classification a watershed can receive.
In 2001, the Town of Canton and Southern Appalachian Highlands Conservancy began exploring ideas for protecting the 870-acre watershed property. The next year the property was placed in a permanent conservation easement, which means the land can never be developed, but can be used by the town for some recreational purposes.
Canton will ultimately receive a little more than $1 million for selling the conservation easement. The Clean Water Management Trust Fund provided the conservation easement through the Southern Appalachian Highlands Conservancy. The trust fund approved a $689,000 grant to permanently to protect about two miles of Rough Creek and about five miles of tributaries from development.
The project received a gift of $400,000 from Brad and Shelli Stanback of Canton, $15,000 from the Pigeon River Fund and $1,000 from Haywood Waterways. Tate said in the fall she will be back to the town board to ask for their support through a matching grant that is being sought from the N.C. Division of Parks and Recreation to complete the Rough Creek trail system. In order to acquire that grant the town may need to show evidence of plans to connect other recreational areas to the Rough Creek Wilderness Preserve, Tate said.
That would not have to be designed trails; it could be a plan as simple as a path for bicycles, she said. “I am so in awe of the town for having the foresight to preserve this watershed area and opening it up to the public,” Tate said.
Peggy Manning can be reached at 452-0661, ext. 127, or at peggy@themountaineer.com
