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Making our trails and greenways safer

We invite you to submit your ideas and experiences with safety, crime, liability, and related issues to American Trails.

With thousands of miles of multi-use trails in North America's cities and many more on public lands, it is important to find feasible ways to reduce accidents and crime and to have reliable, objective data for better trail planning.

Good information is also important to assure that there is sound data that can be shared with concerned citizens; agency officials, the media and others that often inquire about trail safety and security.

The goal is to continue to improve trail safety and to assure that the risks associated with trail recreation are kept in balanced perspective. Some of the kinds of information needed include:

1. Location, type, and other causal information about accidents, crimes, and incidents on multi-use trails and wilderness paths;

2. Accident, crime and incident rates when compared to other factors such as levels of use, design, crowding and other variable factors.

3. Information about successful (and not successful) attempts at improving trail safety such as paving stripes, safety signage, enforcement, and user education;

4. Suggestions for improving trail user safety;

To that end, we are launching the Safe Trails Forum. We invite you to share your stories, your solutions, your attempts at solutions and your suggestions. The Safe Trails Forum will be published both in Trail Tacks and at our Web site (www.americantrails.org). Thank you for your participation.

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For more opportunities for training on trail design, construction, and management see the National Trails Training Partnership area.