Letter from Ross and Julie

Picture, if you will, the year 2048 in Traverse City. What pops into your mind? New trails making regional community connections? Sidewalks and trails filled with folks making their way around? Neighborhoods connected by comfortable and safe streets? While it may seem a long way off, can you believe we are as close to 2048 now as 2023 is to TART Trails' founding 25 years ago?

The 25th anniversary of TART Trails is a great time to stop and reflect on all we’ve accomplished together. Over the past two decades, more than 77 new miles of trail have been built. TART Trails has worked with community members, non-profit partners, tribal nations, and local, state, and federal agencies to provide opportunities for safe, comfortable and convenient ways to move around the region. In those years we’ve seen big dreams come true. From the completion of the Leelanau Trail, to the creation of the Sleeping Bear Heritage Trail, making safer connections in Acme, launching the Nakwema Trailway, and of course, last year’s celebration of a bold vision to complete the Boardman Lake Loop, there’s been a lot to celebrate over 25 years.

While we are proud of all of the progress we’ve made together over the past 25 years, we are even more excited to ponder the possibilities for the next 25. Our work aims to make every home a trailhead within a city and region where people choose to commute by bike or by foot, where safety and courtesy are the most common trail experiences, and where kids can travel along safe routes from their front door to their school yard. Our future is one in which infrastructure protects and promotes all sorts of non-motorized transportation options. In the next 25 years, let’s double the trail network we enjoy today, add another 100 miles of trails throughout the region so ideas like these are possible.

We look forward to working together to turn the next 25 years into the future we all want it to be.

We are on Anishinaabeg Land

TART Trails is committed to healthy, connected communities. We are dedicated to sharing the history of this land, and the connections that the trail network creates—to places we love, to the past, to the future, to each other, and to ourselves.

The entirety of the TART Trails network exists on the ancestral, traditional, and contemporary Lands of the Anishinaabeg—the Three Fires Confederacy of Ojibwe, Odawa, and Potawatomi peoples. Their land was reduced by a war between the French and English, the American Revolution, the 1836 Treaty of Washington, and the formation of the State of Michigan in 1837. By 1855, the Anishinaabeg were forced to cede almost the entirety of their remaining land, leaving only a reserve established in what is now known as Leelanau County. We need to protect and honor the history and people of these places.

When on the TART Trails network, you are in the presence of significant Anishinaabeg sites including:

Windigomitigoing, “At the Giant Pine Trees so huge one could gallop through and not run into them”

Description of the area around the Boardman Lake Loop Trail

Odawaziipi, “Ottawa River”

TART Trail at the mouth of the Boardman River

Makwaatig Gigitowin, council ground at the Bear Hollow Tree Sleeping Bear Heritage Trail

Odena, villages along the Leelanau Trail

Waganaakzi mitig tree markers around the Vasa Pathway

With humility and respect, dbaadendiziwin and minwaadendamowin, we are grateful for the generous care with which the Anishinaabeg, and those of the Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians and the Little Traverse Bay Bands of Odawa Indians, have given and continue to give to this land. We collectively understand that offering this acknowledgement does not absolve settler-colonial privilege or diminish colonial structures of violence at any level.

We are committed to amplifying the full, longstanding history of the land with all who traverse the trails in the TART network. Our collaborative work to care for this land that we cherish is an expression of gratitude and appreciation to those on whose ancestral lands we reside.

Ross Hammersley

— TART Trails Board President

Julie Clark — Chief Executive Officer

Miigwetch, thank you.

TART Trails Turns 25!

TART Trails was formed 25 years ago when four citizen-led trail groups joined forces to more cohesively create change in our community. When we look back over the last quarter of a century, we recognize and honor that our story starts from humble beginnings—grassroots efforts by ardent and eager local individuals who had a vision. People who understood the beauty and the opportunity around us. Folks who worked tirelessly and selflessly to create a landscape that not only elevates the desirability of our region but also solidifies its culture of supporting active, accessible and healthy lifestyles, and environments for generations to come.

Thank you for joining the ranks of these visionary leaders and supporting happy, healthy, connected communities. Join us on a journey as we recognize those who set the foundation as we venture and dare to dream about what comes with the next 25 years of connecting communities by way of trails. Our future is as exciting as our past and tied to the same determination, passion, and purpose that our founders laid before us: discovering, enjoying, exploring, protecting, and connecting where we live, work, and play.

Board Of Directors

—Marsha Smith, Former Executive Director, Rotary Charities of Traverse City