The majority of the month of July for me was heavily focused on the 2011 Great Allegheny Passage Trail User Survey! This project is an update to the 2008 edition of the Economic Impact Study of the Great Allegheny Passage. This survey is an effort of the Laurel Highlands Visitors Bureau, Trail Town Program, and the Allegheny Trail Alliance. I am co-managing this project with Amy Camp of the Trail Town Program. Before the surveys can even be conducted, partners in the project and I discussed options for updating the previous survey particularly which questions to keep, locations, trail head leaders, and so on.
It was decided that the SCA Trail Town Outreach Corps would be the Trail Head Leaders for the towns that we work in and in Maryland the Trail Town Program managers for Frostburg and Cumberland. In 2008, the towns from West Newton to Cumberland were used as survey sights. This year, with the opening of new trail sections, we are looking to survey in two-three survey sites closer to Pittsburgh in Allegheny County. These sites include Boston, McKeesport, and Homestead/Waterfront.
As the documents from 2008 were updated, a new online version had to be created so all data can be collected in one digital location. With the help of Maggie, I created Google documents for the survey and the tally sheet used in the field along with directions for entering the forms online from the field.
Now, onto getting volunteers to help conduct the surveys! After the press release was created by Amy Camp, I started keeping a list of our group of volunteers along the Trail. Emails were sent to previous participants, announcements made a Trail and Town meetings, alerts posted on Facebook and other social medias, and I even picked up a few of my friends to help out to volunteer. At this time, we have about 45 volunteers all the way from Homestead down to Cumberland.
Amy Camp and I hosted two training sessions via conference call to help get trail head leaders and volunteers ready to conduct the surveys out on the GAP. Each on lasted about 30 minutes each and we’re full of good questions and discussions.
The survey started on July 19 and will continue throughout the season to about mid October. We hope to collect about 50-60 surveys each month in each of the Trail Towns, and so far we’re off to a good start!
-William Prince