The mid-point section of the popular Fiery Gizzard Trail in South Cumberland State Park will soon close to hikers, thus closing the 12.5-mile trek between Grundy Forest Trailhead and Foster Falls.
Interim Park Manager George Shinn has announced that the owner of the property near Raven Point, which the trail has crossed for decades, has asked for the removal of the park trail from his property by Dec. 1.
“The only practical solution,” Shinn said, “is to reroute that section of the trail into the cove. But the solution is not easy to accomplish and will significantly increase the difficulty for hikers in the future.”
Similar land issues have forced the Tennessee Department of Environment and Conservation (TDEC) to order the closing of Raven Point Campground, located along the Fiery Gizzard Trail, on Sept. 7.
On Aug. 15, the news broke about threats to the popular trail. Shinn and Friends of South Cumberland (FSC) President Latham Davis were interviewed on a Nashville news station about the trail that put South Cumberland in the national spotlight. Backpacker Magazine voted the Fiery Gizzard Trail among the top 25 hiking trails in the U.S. and in 2014, ranked it sixth on the list of Best Fall Foliage Hikes in the nation. The trail is credited with drawing visitors to South Cumberland and enhancing tourism and the local economy in one of Tennessee’s most rural areas.
“Since the ’70s, the park has operated this trail in partnership with numerous private owners,” Shinn said, “and we have worked hard to maintain strong relations. However, as land is sold or passed on to heirs, these long-standing verbal agreements can change overnight.
“Because of safety and liability issues, the state can not operate without formal agreements,” he added. “We are hopeful that we can persuade those involved to agree to a partnership based on a conservation easement or a memorandum of understanding that will allow the trail and campground to remain open.”
Shinn said that purchasing the land is not always necessary. “We just need agreements and committed partnerships in order to save forever the few miles of trail that cross private property.”
“This is clearly an emergency,” said Mack Prichard, Tennessee State Naturalist Emeritus, who has been involved with the trail for decades.
“To lose a trail like Fiery Gizzard and this key campground is unthinkable.” Prichard said, “We need to mobilize miracles and pull rabbits out of hats. We are going to need some miracles here again.”
FSC President Latham Davis said, “The Friends of South Cumberland have had many successes in acquiring key tracts of land and conservation easements, most recently this summer acquiring several hundred feet of bluff facing Stone Door in Savage Gulf Natural Area. We have good relations with many landowners adjacent to the park, which makes this event on the Fiery Gizzard Trail so puzzling and distressing.”
Raven Point Farm is currently on the market for more than double the appraised value of the land. The owner recently rejected an offer by the FSC to purchase the land at its appraised value.
Mary Priestley, author of “Fiery Gizzard: Voices from the Wilderness” and past president of the FSC said, “We learned that when a Friends group, Land Trust, or other nonprofit buys land, you can’t set the precedent of paying more than the appraised value, because going forward, this will cause other landowners to expect the same inflated prices. A major concern is that the tract could be sold to a developer, ruining the pristine nature of the trail forever.”
At this point, Priestley said, “the Friends’ best hope is for a conservation buyer to come in and purchase Raven Point Farm and establish easements on it. There are substantial tax incentives for doing this; easements would allow for the continued use of the original trail and give the park rangers the access they need.”
The FSC is committed to raising awareness about this recent development at Fiery Gizzard and to partnering with others to find solutions.
Friends members and park rangers are working together to organize volunteers to help build a re-routed section of the trail. To skirt private land, the trail will have to plunge to the bottom of the gorge and back to the top, an 800-foot elevation drop, which will substantially increase the difficulty of the trail. Anyone willing to volunteer in the trail-building effort can go to the FSC website for details.
The FSC, one of the most active state park friends groups in Tennessee, has helped raise millions of dollars to purchase thousands of acres and protect miles of trail and view. Since the Friends began, the park has increased by 10,000 acres.
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