A 4-mile trail in Leechburg is close to opening after months of work by volunteers.
The trail will link Leechburg to a series of trails that span across Armstrong County from Westmoreland to Clarion counties.
Chris Ziegler, executive director of Armstrong Trails, said her organization bought Kiski Junction Railroad in 2022.
About 10 miles of the old rail line path from the Kiski River to Crooked Creek Bridge — a portion of trail that Ziegler calls the main line — took about nine months to complete and opened for use through the help of four consistent volunteers. The project used about $850,000 in donated equipment, $750,000 in donated time and a $120,000 grant.
“We did $1.5 million worth of work for $120,000,” Ziegler said.
With this purchase, the organization went from overseeing 36 miles of trails to 52.5 miles.
Ziegler said she and two other volunteers have been working the four miles of land connecting to Leechburg since the beginning of May, establishing a path for the 10-foot-wide trail and finding and sometimes adding culvert pipes.
Culverts are embedded pipes that are used to maintain the flow of small, shallow streams, swales or ditches where they are crossed by a trail. Ziegler said the 10 miles from the Kiski River to Crooked Creek Bridge had culvert pipes from when the railroad relaid the tracks. Eight culvert pipes were replaced along the 4-mile trail leading to Leechburg.
Ziegler predicted the latest section of trail would be open for use in September.
