Verona ATV club to ‘steward’ the new section over the summer

Jun 03, 2020

The Verona District ATV Club, which has 53 members currently and is growing weekly, is affiliated with the Ontario Federation of ATV clubs, giving its members access to trails across eastern Ontario and beyond.

This summer, however, the Verona club will be focussed on a very local project, the small section of the K&P trail that runs from Bellrock Road at the foot of Verona to Craig Road just north of Verona.

On May 20, Frontenac County Council made that section a multi-use trail, allowing ATV’s on it for the first time, and making the trailhead and parking lot a destination for ATV riders seeking access to the trail system. The trail from Craig Road north has always been open to ATV’s.

But the new designation is only for a trial period, until November of this year.

Mark Moeys, the club President, said he and other club members have been riding and walking the trail every day talking to everyone they meet about how the walkers, hikers, cyclists who use the trail as a village park, can co-exist with ATV’s maintaining a speed of less than 20km and hour.

“ATV’s have been using that section anyway, but the difference is our members are driving slowly and working with the community. We bring control to the situation, and we keep the trail clean. We aren’t going to police the trail, that’s not our roe. We think of ourselves as stewards,” he said.

Recently the club bought a spreader and laid down calcium chloride on two sections of the trail to control dust.

“If we can demonstrate to the community, and the people who live along the trail, that a trail with legal ATV riders instead of illegal riders, is cleaner and more orderly, many of them will come over to our side,” he said.

Moey is taking a leadership role in talking to all trail users about how this can work for everyone.

“I talk to so many people on the trail that my family doesn’t want to walk with me anymore,” he said.

One more complication is that the township has earmarked a property that the trail passes though as the site of a new senior’s housing complex.

“We’ll have to find a work around for that when the time comes,” he said, “it will have to be part of the planning.”

One of the ATV clubs allies in Verona are the local businesses, who see having ATV riders coming to the area and starting their ride in the village instead of north of the village as an opportunity.