complement any state or federal funds
secured by the county agencies. Bike
enthusiast groups and private bicycle busi-
nesses throughout the East Central area
have staged events and fundraisers to sup-
port the trails.
“It’s been quite the overall effort
between several agencies here trying to pre-
serve what little we have left,” Olson says.
“It’s pretty incredible.”
Ongoing collaboration and education
are critical to the project’s long-term suc-
cess, Bartlett says. Education helps people
understand why ecosystems like tallgrass
prairies are worth protecting and helps
residents to better connect with their local
area. The plan for the Kickapoo is to have
educational information posted along the
trail that details the natural and cultural
history of the area, creating a rich story.
“People who know the history of the
prairies and know what’s in the ground,
they support protecting and restoring it,”
Bartlett says.
Researchers at the nearby University of
Illinois at Urbana-Champaign have stud-
ied the prairies for many years, primar-
ily through the Prairie Research Institute
(
prairie.illinois.edu
), a consortium of
several state survey groups. In addition to
regular surveys, the groups provide out-
reach and education on prairies. Some
University of Illinois students have vol-
unteered for trail development and main-
tenance activities, and others have done
prairie research.
Student involvement also extends to
local county schools. Schoolchildren are
bused in to help plant seeds and seedlings
while learning about the prairie ecosystem.
In this way, they too can become stewards
of the land.
County staff have been successful in
showing farmers that they have shared
interests and concerns, such as invasive
species control, or drainage and storm-
water management. “Around the Kickapoo
railroad corridor, for example, farmers that
have drainage issues work cooperatively
with corridor managers,” Bartlett says.
“That’s a win-win approach there.” Once
the farmers understand the value of pro-
tecting the prairies and developing a trail,
they become supporters as well.
Long-term collaboration will be needed
once the trails are in place, because pre-
viously disturbed prairies require active
management to preserve biological diver-
sity and maintain an ecologically healthy
ecosystem. When a prairie has been dis-
turbed, the natural processes that origi-
nally maintained the system are reduced
or eliminated. That means ongoing main-
tenance such as removing invasive species,
performing prescribed burns, replanting
and seeding, and restoring natural hydrol-
ogy may need to occur.
To support ongoing restoration efforts,
for the past decade native plant seeds have
been collected from both abandoned and
active railroad corridors. One group that
has been hard at work on these efforts
is Grand Prairie Friends (GPF) (
grand
prairiefriends.org
), an all-volunteer,
nonprofit conservation organization. The
CCFPD also collects seeds for larger prai-
rie restoration.
Conservation and Rail-Trail History
This level of collaboration between con-
servationists and trail builders isn’t always
the norm. But the Heartland Pathways has
A 100-year-old trestle bridge spanning the
Vermilion River near Danville that will be a
highlight of the Kickapoo Rail Trail
Adria Hamel with son Jacob and daughter
Hailey enjoy a bike ride over the
Sangamon River Trail bridge, which runs
along the Heartland Pathways.
ELIZABETH STRIANO
CHRIS BUCHER
CHRIS BUCHER
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