Revised Blue Mound State Park Trail network amendment available for review
MOUNT HOREB, Wis. - A revised draft amendment for an updated trail network within Blue Mound State Park is now available for public review.
The draft amendment updates the property trail network plan for a number of summer and winter trail uses. This revised plan retains the popular Overlode mountain bike trail, with some modification to improve trail sustainability, provide a core of un-fragmented interior forest landscape, protect sensitive waterways and continue access to the eastern edge of the park.
The revised plan also eliminates a proposed multiuse trail. The revised plan retains a 1.4-mile snowmobile corridor that connects the Military Ridge State Trail to Blue Mound State Park and continues north between 40-50 feet from the Mounds Park Road road-edge to the intersection at Ryan Road. The route will cross Ryan Road and continue to the northern boundary of the park. Controlled stop signed intersections will be established at Ryan Road and all recreational trail / route crossings south of Ryan Road.
The state Natural Resources Board authorized a review of the park's master plan in December 2014 following a request from state and local advocates for snowmobiling that the Department of Natural Resources re-open a snowmobile trail in the Pleasure Valley area of the park that was abandoned in the early 1980s when a neighboring property was closed to snowmobiling, making the trail through Blue Mounds a dead end.
The revised draft master plan amendment will be considered by the state Natural Resources Board at its Jan. 27, 2016 meeting in Madison. People may provide comments on the revised draft plan to the board either in writing or by attending the meeting. People need to register to testify before the board by 11 a.m., Friday, Jan. 22, 2016. Information on registering can be found on theNRB public participation page of the DNR website.
Blue Mound State Park located in Iowa and Dane counties, consists of 1,159 acres of state park lands that includes outstanding vistas of the surrounding landscape while offering camping, hiking, mountain biking, picnicking and a swimming pool complex.
The draft amendment and supporting documents are available by searching the Wisconsin DNR website, dnr.wi.gov, for keywords "master planning" and then clicking on the link for the Blue Mound State Park plan amendment.