A typical hiking trail costs, on average, about $1,000 per mile to maintain. Leave it neglected until it has eroded and is in need of serious reconstruction and you can plan on spending upwards of $50,000 per mile to repair the trail. Our failure to act today only compounds itself over time.
Another way of saying if you want your trails maintained, you’re apt to end up doing it yourself. (Hey, it’s great exercise.)
My trail work experience: it was certainly difficult and labor consuming, but it made me feel good. Especially when I am out appreciating the woods.
Here in Shenandoah National Park, almost all of the non horse trails are maintained by Potomoc Appalachian Trail Club overseers. The park has 3 different trail crews of 2-3 that maintain the rest of the trails with the assistance of the Youth Conservation Corps and the Student Conservation Association. One for each district of the park.
One of my responsibilities in the park as an SCA is to maintain trail signs… and there are a ton of them!! Last week I also spent a full day rehabing social trails that cut switchbacks on a couple mile stretch of trail.
If people stopped vandalizing signs and followed simple rules like not cutting switchbacks, my work would be cut by 25%. If they camped at campsites that meet the backcountry regulations, my work would be cut 50%. A simple LNT education could go along way to reduce the cost to repair trails.