Saturday, January 10, 2009

Trailsafe on Pleasant Run Parkway

Trailsafe on Pleasant Run Parkway
By: Jon Clucas

Pleasant Run

In October 2008, Mayor Greg Ballard announced new public safety initiatives for Indy Parks and Greenways trails. In southeast Marion county, the Pleasant Run trail is one of the trails planned to be safer thanks to the new Trailsafe program.

The Trailsafe program will be fully implemented by volunteers who frequent the trails. Any regular Indy Parks trail user is invited to sign up to monitor a 1 – 2 mile stretch of trail and note any vandalism, unsafe conditions, or maintenance issues. With frequent updates from Trailsafe volunteers, the Department of Public Safety will be able to deal with problems efficiently.

Pleasant Run Parkway runs 6.9 miles from Garfield Park to Ellenberger Park. Anyone interested in monitoring a section of Pleasant Run Parkway (or any other Indy Parks trail) should email Annie Brown at abrown@indygov.org . In your email, be sure to include your first name, middle initial, and last name, your full address, at least one phone number, your email address, your social security number, your date of birth, your top three choices for what section of trail you would like to monitor, and how flexible you are regarding these choices.

Indy Parks runs a background check on each of their volunteers. If you show interest in volunteering for the program and submit your information, Indy Parks may select you to monitor a segment of the trail. If you are selected, Indy Parks will contact you with further details, including training and scheduling.

The Trailsafe program allows people who actually use the trails to be responsible for keeping track of the maintenance of the trails they use. This program will thus help Indy Parks and the Department of Public Safety stay up to date with trail conditions, and will also help make sure problems are dealt with in order of importance. As the Trailsafe program gets going, Pleasant Run Parkway will become an increasingly pleasant run.

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