Vandalism along Thomson’s Cut

Jul 05, 2017

Canada Day visitors to Sharbot Lake probably noticed the vandalism that has occurred along the Thomson’s Rock Cut section of the soon-to-be K & P Trail.

The Rock Cut is the connecting link between Railway Heritage Park (The Caboose) and Oso Beach.

It’s been a project of two community groups, the Multi-Use Facility Committee of Central Frontenac Council and the Central Frontenac Railway Heritage Society to both preserve our railway heritage and “look towards the future,” said Gary Giller, a member of both groups.

Giller said the extent of the vandalism was the removal of about half of the ‘delineators’ — posts that are outfitted with reflective tape to mark the extent of walking trail to keep hikers and motorized users of the trail separate.

Giller said there was an initial incident on June 19 when several delineators were uprooted and left at the sides of the trail. A second incident occurred over the the weekend of June 23.

“It’s disconcerting,” he said. “A lot of volunteer hours from two groups have gone into this project as well as a lot of grant money.

“We were hoping to have everything looking good for Canada Day but . . .”

The delineators aren’t cheap. There are 30 of them in total and at $90 apiece the price tag is $2,700 just for the posts. Installation has been extra.

Few, if any, of the delineators have been damaged beyond repair but there are the issues of re-installation as well as the possibility of recurring events.

And the June incidents haven’t been the only ones.

“We knew the delineators weren’t permanent,” Giller said. “But because there is a walking side to the trail and a wider side for motorized traffic, we wanted to get something in place before the snowmobilers took to the trail last fall for both safety and aesthetic reasons.”

But it didn’t take long for vandals to have an impact and several delineators were uprooted.

This spring, after the Township stepped up putting down rock dust and limestone chips on both the walkway and motorized trail, Giller said they hired Charles Bedore to bury the delineators deeper and things were looking good.

“Charles did a great job,” he said. “It was really looking good.”

Giller said the incidents have been reported to the police but there are no suspects in the case.

“We’re not pointing any fingers,” he said. “We’ve heard some names but you can’t accuse anybody because there are no eyewitnesses.”

Where the Heritage Society goes from here is anybody’s guess, mostly because of lack of funding. They have applied for grants and will apply for whatever comes along, especially with an eye towards permanent pillars of some sort.

“It’s disappointing when this sort of thing happens,” Giller said. “A lot of people worked really hard to do something positive for the community.”