Camp DREAM/Vermont Youth Conservation Corps Collaboration

Kids build trails while having summer camp experiences.

Project sponsor: Camp DREAM and Vermont Youth Conservation Corps

Award Category: Environment and Wildlife Compatibility

Congressional District: Peter Welch (D-At Large-VT)

Senators: Patrick Leahy (D) and Bernard Sanders (I)

2007 Annual Achievement Award winner: for trail projects funded through the Recreational Trails Program of the Federal Highway Administration. Awarded by the Coalition for Recreation Trails.

Camp DREAM provides summer camp experiences to low-income youth from Vermont. The DREAM program is entirely devoted not only to increasing access to wilderness experiences for low-income children in Vermont, but also to allowing all Vermonters to enjoy the same kinds of experiences through the public trail facilities that they are constructing.

This project involved DREAM and the Vermont Youth Conservation Corps working together to establish a safe, one-mile beginner mountain bike/cross-country ski trail as well as the construction of a 0.25 mile-long boardwalk to provide educational access to a Class-II wetland, which will be used as an interpretive trail.

This project required building, maintaining, and upgrading 3,520 feet of trail surface to reduce erosion. It also required the design and construction of 45 puncheon bridges through the wetland area as well as re-vegetating the area around the trail work to reduce the environmental impact.

Eight Corps Members and two Crew Leaders from the Vermont Youth Conservation Corps spent two weeks completing this project. Additionally, while assigned to this project, the crew conducted a program to educate the public about the Camp DREAM trails, public use of the trails, and trail work as it relates to conservation, service, and education.

The program also covered what life on a VYCC crew is like while completing high-priority conservation projects and spike camping in the Vermont woods for four weeks. Over 50 people attended this program.

For more information:

Chris Howell, Camp DREAM, P.O. Box 361, Winooski, VT 05404; 802-655-9015

For more great trails, see:

• The Vermont Trails page and nationwide index of state-by-state trail links
• Featured National Recreation Trails in Vermont

See previous Recreational Trails Program Award Winners:

• 2006
• 2005
• 2004
• 2003
• 2002
• 2001
• 2000

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