Cherryfield Man Sees Downeast Sunrise Trail as Catalyst for Development

April 03, 2007 - by Fred Hastings - Reprinted with permission of The Downeast Coastal Press

Sparked by interest in Gov. John Baldacci's executive order decision to remove the state-owned rails and track between Ellsworth and Pembroke in favor of a multi-use recreational trail, Cherryfield entrepreneur and outdoor enthusiast Arthur Tenan has come up with a strategic plan for capitalizing on western Washington County’s natural resources should the thoroughfare be built.

Known as the Downeast Sunrise Trail (DST), the 85-mile rail bed winds through some of the most picturesque and varied terrain in the state, including Schoodic Mountain, Donnell Pond, the Great Heath, blueberry barrens, peat bogs, salt marshes and Maine's Ice Age Trail. Largely inaccessible to most vehicular traffic, the landscape has seen few visitors. But Tenan believes the rebuilt corridor will be the key to opening the door to the wide-ranging topography, along with bridging the divide between the everyday eco-tourist—including hikers, cross-country skiers, primitive campers and kayakers—and the traditional Maine outdoorsman who takes to the wilds to hunt and fish and explore the back country with snowmobiles and all-terrain vehicles.

"Some 24 percent of Maine's tourism dollar is spent in the Bar Harbor/Acadia region," said Tenan, "and only 2 percent Down East." He's convinced that imbalance can be adjusted in Down East's favor through the state's construction of the trail and private business development of the services and amenities sought by tourists and local outdoor recreational enthusiasts.

A Dream Several Years in the Making

The idea of opening facilities to attract more visitors to western Washington County has been on Tenan's mind for some time. Citing the loss of a bank, real estate office and insurance agency in recent years, Tenan said he lamented what appears to be Cherryfield's "slow death." Even the town's economic mainstays, blueberry firms Jasper Wyman & Son and Cherryfield Foods, are providing fewer jobs than in years past. Cherryfield Foods, which is under Canadian ownership, has transferred most of its processing to New Brunswick, he said.
What to do to reverse the slide? Working with Dianne Tilton, the former executive director of the Sunrise County Economic Council who is now a private consultant with RHR Smith, Tenan has developed a multi-phased strategic plan that calls for development of several outdoor-related facilities over the next three to five years.

His first phase, with target completion later this spring, is not dependent on the Downeast Sunrise Trail. It includes the opening of three primitive campgrounds north of Route 9 in the former International Paper Company lands—Upper Cranberry Lake, Lower Sabao Lake and Deer Lake. Tenan said he is negotiating a lease-purchase agreement with Sustainable Forest Technologies, the firm that manages the property for a land-holding company. The wilderness sites have fallen into disrepair since the state discontinued its support of them years ago, he said.

Phase 2, with a desired completion date of spring 2008, requires a greater financial investment and is more dependent on progress being shown on development of the trail. It includes the construction of a new lodge, restaurant, guest cabins and rental equipment depot on Tenan-owned property overlooking the Narraguagus River in downtown Cherryfield. The 9-acre parcel, with frontage on Main Street, abuts 800 feet of the trail as it passes easterly between the Upper Corner behind the C.H. Mathews store and the Cherryfield Stretch (Route 1 between Cherryfield and Harrington) just beyond the now-closed True Value store.

Tenan envisions a log-built lodge with three or four suites and another six or eight cabins. The dining area could accommodate up to 100 people.

Phase 3, looking to the out years of 2009 and 2010, calls for construction of connecting trails on the West Branch of the Narraguagus River to join a planned campground on the Sprague Falls Road in Cherryfield. Tenan owns 100 acres at the terminus of the road, where he plans to build tent platforms on the site for primitive-camping enthusiasts and hikers. The property is adjacent to the Maine Public Reserve Land units at Spring River Lake with its miles of hiking trails, ponds and granite-topped summits, an expanse stretching between Cherryfield and Donnell Pond in Franklin known as Black's Woods. New trails would be built from the site to divert motorized recreational traffic away from the reserved lands and onto the Downeast Sunrise Trail.

Tenan's perception extends far beyond his own property and business interests. Although he sees the Cherryfield lodge as a base of operations, he views the site more as a hub for a variety of recreation-based activities extending throughout the entire western Washington County area, activities involving other towns and many other people, working with others or on their own, but all sharing a common vision.

Since earlier this year, Tenan has been attending meetings of the Sunrise Trails Coalition, the main lobbying group that is working with state agencies to bring about the rails-to-trails conversion. Officers and members of the coalition, including Sally Jacobs of Orono and Bill Ceckler of Hancock, toured the site of Tenan's proposed lodge last week following a regular monthly meeting held at the nearby Cherryfield Academy building. Jacobs, who endorsed Tenan’s efforts when he presented them to the group in January, reiterated her support while walking the grounds and the rails with members of the press.

Tenan's already had discussions with Capt. Steve Pagels, the Cherryfield resident who operates boat tours and windjammer cruises out of Bar Harbor as well as a ferry service between Mount Desert Island and Winter Harbor, for possible tie-ins with his activities. Linking up with lobster boat tour operators in the western county region is also on his list, along with possible sightseeing flights operating out of the Deblois airstrip.

"We haven't tapped our potential,: said the 48-year-old, convinced better days are ahead for the Downeast region. Recalling that Cherryfield was once a destination for outdoor enthusiasts, primarily for the Atlantic salmon fishing on the Narraguagus River, he said, "I hope to make Cherryfield a destination again."

Lobbying Efforts Under Way to Fund Rails-to-Trails Conversion

Arthur Tenan, the Cherryfield entrepreneur who last week unveiled plans for developing a Downeast wilderness experience in western Washington County, joined others last week in Augusta who testified before the Legislature’s appropriations committee in support of a Trails for a Healthy Maine bond in the amount of $10 million. The Legislature is currently weighing several bond packages to be put before the voters in June and in November.

"Washington County offers incredible outdoor recreational opportunities," said Tenan in his testimony, "but lacks a single focal point, like a Mount Katahdin or a Moosehead Lake. The [Downeast Sunrise] Trail (DST) could become such a focal point, offering recreational opportunities for tourists and residents alike."

Some of the bond funds, if approved, would help finance the rails-to-trails conversion for the 85-mile-long train corridor stretching from Washington Junction in Ellsworth to Ayers Junction in Pembroke along the former Calais Branch Line.

Maine Department of Transportation officials have estimated that it will cost between $30,000 and $50,000 per mile to convert the old rail bed. Charlie Corliss, a Cherryfield resident and former employee of the Land Use Regulation Commission, last week transferred to the Department of Conservation’s Park and Lands Unit, where he will take up duties as the trail manager for the DST. Reportedly, the DOC has already hired three engineers to oversee the project and the bidding process has already begun for taking up the abandoned track.

The Sunrise Trail Coalition, a group of environmentalists and outdoor recreation enthusiasts headed by Sally Jacobs of Orono and Bill Ceckler of Hancock, is the lead organization supporting the rails-to-trails conversion. According to its Web site (www.sunrisetrails.org), the mission of the coalition is to "promote outdoor recreation, health and fitness, and economic development in Hancock and Washington counties … through education and the development of an integrated on- and off-road four-season, shared-use trail."

Not Total Agreement That Rails-to-Trails the Right Move

Not everyone believes taking up the rails to make way for trails is a good thing or the Downeast economy’s salvation. Critics fall into two camps:

- Those who believe in refurbishing the tracks and bringing back trains—either freight, or, more likely, passenger and tourist lines, similar to those currently operating in the southern and mid-coast regions of the state and planned as well for between Brewer and Ellsworth. Refurbishing the tracks would not only preserve the huge investment already made in them, which will be lost by salvaging the rails, but use them today in economically viable ways if not on a level when they hauled freight.

Although little demand has been shown for freight trains Down East because of dying industry, private entrepreneurs in recent years have proposed operating tourist trains, overtures that have been spurned by the state.
Although Sally Jacobs of the Orono Land Trust and Bill Ceckler of the Frenchman Bay Conservancy, who head the Sunrise Trail Coalition, support snowmobiles and all-terrain vehicles on the "multi-use" trail, this attitude is not shared by most environmentalists, who ardently oppose motorized traffic, seeing it as a threat to the environment and working persistently at restricting vehicle use in the national parks and other government lands.

A spokesman for preserving the rails is a well-known advocate for trains Down East, Herb Cleaves of Whiting, a former railroad worker for Bangor and Aroostook and Maine Central, as was his father before him, and the co-author of a definitive history of the Bangor and Aroostook Railroad in 1986. His views on the rails-to-trails conversion:

"At the insistence of special interests, Gov. John Baldacci, by executive order, transferred this valuable asset to trail advocates without soliciting public opinion in the form of a referendum. This ill-conceived and ill-timed move by the state’s chief executive officer definitely seals the lid on real business expansion in Washington County, the kind that would trim the unemployment rolls substantially. Small business is fine for the few; bigger business is better for the community at large."

- A second camp includes those who believe the emphasis on eco-tourism is misplaced—that instead of the state investing millions in infrastructure such as the trail and its attendant facilities and amenities—and without any hard evidence that they will attract users in significant numbers if built—the focus on stimulating the local economy should be on private technology and the emerging industries. Rather than re-creating pre-colonial conditions in the hopes of attracting visits by the masses of people in the presently advanced areas, Washington County residents should be allowed by the state to replicate their success Down East.

A spokesman for this viewpoint is Erich Veyhl of Trescott, a Harvard-trained computer scientist and the editor of the Maine Property Rights Newsletter, an online journal that monitors public policies affecting land-use issues.

"It's not that trails as such are necessarily bad if properly located, but you cannot build a modern economy based on wilderness trails and de-industrialization. The claimed goal of 'helping the economy' is an illusion intended to benefit the few. It’s the appeal of 'open space feudalism' discussed by economist George Reisman, who described such preservationist projects as no more than the old story of the feudal lords who are to have vast forests set aside for their enjoyment, while the serfs dare not remove a log for their fires or kill an animal for their meal."