Scenic status sought for a Pinelands trail

You could call it a paradoxical crossroads.

In the most densely populated state and most heavily crisscrossed travel corridor in the nation lies a 1.1-million-acre ecological treasure so spectacular that the Pinelands National Reserve was designated in 1978 as the first such federally protected region.

Since then, most drivers have just zoomed through on their way to or from the Jersey Shore. But now, officials would like them to stop and smell the pine needles.

Next week, the New Jersey Department of Transportation and the Pinelands Commission will hold two public hearings on a management plan for the 130-mile Southern Pinelands Natural Heritage Trail, a state scenic byway that winds through five counties and 16 municipalities.

State officials also are seeking to have the trail designated as one of more than 120 National Scenic Byways, which include Historic Route 66, the Santa Fe Trail, and the Blue Ridge Parkway. The designation - which would be the first in New Jersey - would mean more visibility and funding.

The trail received a $200,000 federal grant in 2005 for planning. Officials hope to complete the project by 2010.

"This really is the first time the Pinelands is being celebrated for the remarkable place that it really is," said Barry Brady, an archaeologist and resource planner for the Pinelands Commission, who helped craft the trail. "The idea is to get people out of their cars and into spending time at the sites, really seeing and experiencing it. Not just the diverse landscape, but also the culture of the various places along the trail."

Brady and others said that for a long time, the Pinelands might have appeared to be nothing but a vast wilderness of dense forests and serene rivers offering little for the casual observer.

While places in the Pinelands such as Wharton State Forest allow hikers, campers, and canoeists to get close to nature, more passive visitors may have had a harder time enjoying the area.

The trail, following main arteries including Routes 50, 9 and 87, will use yet-to-be-created logos and signage to direct drivers to attractions.

The state also plans to distribute brochures and other materials that would lead visitors on "theme" tours focused, for example, on the fabled Jersey Devil, the Pine Robbers from the stagecoach era, or little-known Revolutionary War history.

But it may still be the biodiversity and wilderness beauty in this last unbroken natural area between New York and Philadelphia that leave visitors in awe. The forests make it a bird-watcher's paradise by day and a stargazer's dream at night.

And along the trail there's the chance to see how little communities such as Port Republic, Nesco, and Mauricetown have evolved over the centuries.

"I think what is really interesting about this new trail is that it lets people know that this is not just a wide expanse of pine trees but a very special place that warrants state and federal protection," said Mike Hogan of Weymouth Township, Atlantic County.

Hogan, a nature photographer whose work is featured in Natural Wonders of the Jersey Pines and Shore, a book by Robert A. Peterson, worked on a local committee with the Pinelands Commission and Transportation Department to recommend trail sites that could benefit local economies through increased tourism.

Although he has lived in the Pinelands for a while, Hogan said, he never gets over the beauty so close to population centers.

The traffic between Pennsylvania and New Jersey is the highest interstate volume in the nation, just ahead of that between New Jersey and New York, according to the federal Department of Transportation.

Like the New Jersey Coastal Heritage Trail, which was created in the late 1980s along the Atlantic Ocean and Delaware Bay, the Southern Pinelands trail melds an appreciation of scenic and historic sites, said Cindy Bloom-Cronin, scenic byway coordinator for the state.

For the last year, a coalition of county and local officials from Atlantic, Burlington, Cape May, Cumberland, and Ocean Counties has developed a management plan for the byway, she said. The hearings next week will seek the public's input.

The entire trail doesn't have to be experienced on one marathon drive; that would have motorists traveling from Ocean County's Tuckerton Seaport in Little Egg Harbor Township down through Batsto Village in Burlington County, through the old industrial towns of Elwood and Weymouth in Atlantic County, to places such as Port Elizabeth in Cumberland County and Woodbine and Dennisville in Cape May County.

Instead, visitors should explore the regions in small chunks, advised author Patricia Robinson, whose book The New Jersey Coastal Heritage Trail breaks down that tour in easy-to-digest segments.

"I think the key for something like the Coastal Heritage Trail and this new scenic byway is that it gives people a way they can get into and experience a region from an entirely new perspective," Robinson said. "And ultimately that is important in building appreciation and understanding of these historically and environmentally important areas of our state."

Two public hearings on the Southern Pinelands Natural Heritage Trail plan are scheduled:

March 24: 7 p.m., Borough Hall,

501 Washington Ave., Woodbine,

Cape May County.

March 25: 7 p.m.,

City Hall, 500 London Ave., Egg Harbor City,

Atlantic County.

For more information, call the Pinelands Commission at 609-894-7300.

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