Mountains-to-Sea State Recreational Trail Master Plan
The goal of the Mountains-to-Sea State Trail is to create a continuous off road trail that will link Clingmans Dome in the Great Smoky Mountains National Park to Jockey’s Ridge State Park on the Outer Banks. A flagship project of the North Carolina State Parks System, currently there are over 600 miles of the 1,000+ mile route open for use.
The North Carolina Division of Parks and Recreation has developed a master plan to chart a path toward designation of remaining planned portions of the trail. The master plan describes the trail sections to be designated, recommends priorities for preparing plans for logical sub-sections of the trail, makes implementation recommendations for remaining trail segments, outlines potential partners and their roles, identifies funding strategies and sources, and provides tools for segment managers.
Planning Communities conducted scoping meetings with all potential segment managers for sections of the planned trail route that are not currently designated sections of the MST to identify local planning efforts, capacity and resources to support trail development. The firm developed logical planning segments and established criteria to prioritize those segments for implementation. The Master Plan presents planning information, resources and recommendations for both these prioritized planning segments and existing sections of the MST. Regional stakeholder meetings were conducted to review and receive feedback on the draft Master Plan. A meeting was also held during development of the Master Plan to support planning for a regional trail along the Coastal Crescent, a trail concept that was originally proposed as a potential alternate route for the MST.
A dedicated website was established to serve as the digital home of the Master Plan and future updates, display a map of the full MST and trail planning segments, link together existing and future trail segment managers, and provide a central place to acquire and exchange information. The MST Master Plan and website were finalized in summer 2015.
