The Craig Botetourt Scenic Trail is one of five priority trail projects identified by Virginia’s new Office of Trails. The 26-mile route generally will follow Craig Creek.
June 2023
Overview: The Craig Botetourt Scenic Trail is one of five priority trail projects identified by Virginia’s new Office of Trails.
As a kid growing up in Craig County, Mandy Adkins had a great source for interesting stories from the area thanks to her dad, Woody Lipps. Lipps’ career with the U.S. Forest Service, including in law enforcement, provided lots of interaction with the local community.
Many stories focused on interesting people and their deeds, but Adkins remembered one that involved a good part of the community. Around the turn of the millennium, the county was buzzing with talk of a proposed rail trail though the Craig Creek valley.
“I grew up hearing about it at the dinner table,” Adkins recalled.
While the effort stalled then, it has been revived as the Craig Botetourt Scenic Trail, and this time Adkins is not just hearing about it. As the director of Botetourt County’s Parks and Recreation Department, she’s a key member of the team behind the effort. And so is her dad, who is a member of a Craig County citizen committee focusing on the trail.
“Given that I grew up in Craig County, and came from an outdoor family, it’s really exciting to work on a project that I’ve been connected to basically my entire life,” Adkins said.
State amps up its focus on trails
The Craig Botetourt Scenic Trail is one of five priority trail projects identified by Virginia’s new Office of Trails, which launched in 2022 in the wake of an $89 million appropriation from the General Assembly.
The budget authorized up to $5 million — $1 million for each priority trail — for the first steps of surveying, analysis, engineering and planning. That work is underway on the Craig Botetourt Scenic Trail. There is no set timeline for the start of actual construction.
The other priority trails are the Eastern Shore Rail Trail, the Shenandoah Valley Rail Trail, the Tobacco Heritage Trail across the counties of Brunswick, Charlotte, Halifax, Lunenburg and Mecklenburg, and the Peaks to Creeks Trail in the Lynchburg area.
The Craig Botetourt Scenic Trail will follow a long-abandoned railroad right of way that winds from New Castle in Craig County to Eagle Rock in Botetourt County. The 26-mile route generally follows Craig Creek but veers from the stream along much of its path.
The Virginia Department of Transportation owns the right of way. Parts of it are paved and used as roadways, but much of the route passes through woods and fields.
“It’s been sitting there for years,” said Del. Terry Austin, R-Botetourt, who was a primary advocate for funding for the early stages of the trail’s development. “Rail trails have been very successful and county administrators in Botetourt and Craig have learned that this is an asset that hasn’t been tapped.”
Both counties have established citizen committees to help with planning and to listen to residents’ suggestions and concerns.
When an early job with the Forest Service took him to Craig County, he figured the stop would be just temporary as his career progressed.
“We didn’t figure to be here too long,” he said. “But we liked it so much we decided to stay.”
And they stayed after Lipps retired in 2015.
A Craig County native, Mandy Adkins (front right) is working on the Craig Botetourt Scenic Trail as the director of Botetourt County’s Parks and Recreation Department. Her father, Woody Lipps (center rear), is a member of the Craig County citizens committee focused on the trail. Photo by Mark Taylor.
Lipps remembers well what happened the last time the idea of converting the state-owned rail right of way was floated. Many Craig County residents vocally opposed the idea, citing fears that such a trail would attract unsavory visitors and lead to problems ranging from litter to crime.
At a public meeting in New Castle in the fall of 2000, attendees booed and hissed as trail advocates tried to tout the potential for the project. (This reporter was there, covering the meeting for The Roanoke Times.)
Lipps said he’s hearing some similar input this time around, too. He said he appreciates the concern from some of his fellow Craig County residents, who like privacy and worry about the potential impact of visitors.
“We all live here for the same reasons,” he said of the quiet, rural lifestyle.
But diving into research has helped Lipps learn about rail trails and their actual impacts on communities.
“Tourism brings direct economic impact,” Lipps said. “And studies have found that when trails are constructed, crime rates either are unchanged or actually go down.”
Lipps believes that the same things that appeal to him about Craig County — the rugged natural beauty, outdoors recreation and interesting history — will appeal to visitors. A trail might not be a massive tourism draw on its own, Lipps acknowledges, but it can be a key part of a suite of attractions, of which he believes Craig County has plenty.
“We don’t really have infrastructure for industry,” he said. “But we have the outdoors.”
He’s interacted with visitors both during his time with the Forest Service and as a resident in the county’s Broad Run area, a popular destination for hunters and off-roaders. During his career, Lipps for a time oversaw the Forest Service’s law enforcement in the region, including on the 17-miles of the Virginia Creeper Trail on national forest land between Damascus and Whitetop.
The kind of folks he saw on that trail are the kinds of folks he expects to use the Craig Botetourt Scenic Trail.
“If you asked me to give you a stereotype of the people who come to Damascus to use that trail, they are outdoors enthusiasts who respect the land and landowners,” Lipps said. “They appreciated the privilege.”
And they spend money.
Rail trails boost rural economies
Greenways and rails-to-trails conversions aren’t booming simply because communities like the idea. Vast amounts of data show that investing in trails makes good financial sense.
“All the economic impact studies we’ve done and others have done show that trails are foundational to economic opportunity and overall economic competitiveness of a region,” said Kelly Pack, senior director of trail development at the nonprofit Rails-to-Trails Conservancy.
Pack said analysis of similar trails in Pennsylvania, West Virginia, Ohio and Florida show that each trail has an economic impact of $6 million to $8 million annually.
“You can see how that can pay for a project in a few years,” Pack said.
That figure includes both direct and indirect spending. It can include money tourists spend on food and lodging, as well as the local impact of businesses that launch to serve trail users, like bike or kayak rental shops.
There are other values that are harder to quantify. For example, Pack said, there is evidence that health care costs decline in areas with lots of trails.
“We even have a 2020 study by the National Association of Realtors that finds that more people who have walkable amenities near their homes are more satisfied with their quality of life,” said Pack, noting the importance of that in recruiting and retaining both businesses and residents. “Those are the things people are looking for when they’re deciding where to live.”
The real estate issue is one that was brought up the last time the idea of the Craig Botetourt Scenic Trail was raised. Some critics worried that having a nearby trail would reduce property values.
Lipps said that concern still exists.
“I had a friend who lives near the trail tell me that he was thinking of selling,” Lipps said. “I told him to wait until the trail was finished because his home will be worth more.”
Jeff Fletcher is a Roanoke Realtor who admits that 20 years ago he was skeptical about the impact trails and greenways might have on property values.
“I was not much of a believer when they started the Roanoke River Greenway early in my real estate career, but I am now,” Fletcher said. “Proximity to any trail is a selling point these days.”
Fletcher recently was the listing agent for a home adjacent to the Jackson River Scenic Trail, which runs along a long-abandoned rail bed from Covington north toward Lake Moomaw along the Jackson River.
“The listing got an unbelievable amount of both Zillow views and saves,” he said. “The river was the primary draw but the trail was mentioned by most of the potential buyers I spoke with.”
Despite the home being nearly 200 years old and sold “as is,” it quickly sold for $300,000.
A nearby model
In terms of terrain and scenery, the Craig Botetourt Scenic Trail is probably most similar to the section of the Virginia Creeper Trail that runs between Abingdon and Damascus. But those involved in the effort say they consider the Jackson River Scenic Trail an excellent model.
“We actually recently took a tour up there,” Lipps said.
Jon Lanford, Botetourt County’s assistant county administrator, was the Alleghany County administrator when development of the Jackson River Scenic Trail was getting started. He said he sees many parallels between the two projects.
For example, some residents who lived adjacent to the Jackson River rail bed were essentially using the right of way as an extension of their own property.
“We had a swimming pool on the right of way,” Lanford said. “We had a cattle chute and piles of wood.”
Lanford said residents were cooperative as trail-building got under way.
“Our biggest challenge was putting the funding together,” he said.
That turned out to benefit the effort in a way, though, because it required a measured approach to the trail construction.
“The key was building it in phases,” he said. “We built the easy pieces first and as it expanded we got a lot of community support.”
The trail has become a popular destination for walkers, runners and cyclists, as well as fishermen who use the trail to access the river at a few spots where they are not deterred by private land on both sides of the trail.
Each June the trail is the setting for the Jackson River Scenic Trail Marathon, Half Marathon, 10K and 5K, which last year attracted 264 total runners, the vast majority from outside Covington.
Next steps
Although $1 million has been set aside for planning and engineering, Lanford said he’s hopeful that the cost will be less.
Once that phase is complete, presuming the state continues its funding commitment, construction can begin. It will include clearing parts of the right of way that are currently overgrown, grading the surface, creating access points, and installing signage and safety measures such as gates at road crossings.
Lanford said that he expects the approach will be similar to the Jackson River Scenic Trail construction, occurring in stages over several years.
For Adkins, who along with her husband has two young boys at home now, the idea that the Craig Botetourt Scenic Trail is finally looking more like a reality is thrilling.
“I followed in my father’s footsteps in the outdoors and in becoming a public servant,” she said. “And it’s really exciting that I get to work on this project with him now.”
