Stories from Main Street: Episode 3
Elkin Becomes a Trail Town
Over the past months, trails in North Carolina have seen higher use, a product of safety-seeking measures prompted by Covid-19. For Elkin, this highlighted what many in the town already knew; that our natural resources are true assets that can bring joy and satisfaction and even turn around a small town’s economic future. We spoke with Elkin local Bob Hillyer, founding member of the Elkin Valley Trails Association (EVTA), a group that has worked hard to counter the loss of industry in Elkin by leveraging a surrounding network of trails to draw hikers, commerce, and community back to their main street.
Bob has a long history with trails. His father, a 30 year Appalachian Trail maintainer and author of the first Mountain to Sea Trail book, taught him trail maintenance. Since his early days on NC trails, Bob has hiked routes all over the world including the Alps, Himalayas, Inca trail, The Camino de Santiago, the Kumano Kodo Trail, and through-hiked the Appalachian trail.
Elkin has roughly 4,000 inhabitants, and is located at the foothills of the Appalachians, half an hour from the Virginia border. In the 1870s Chatham Blanket gave Elkin a reputation for textiles, at one point becoming the largest blanket manufacturer in the world. Despite more than a 100 years of ownership the company went bankrupt in 1992, echoing similar stories of industry gone across North Carolina. Elkin’s downtown, once known for a lively cruising scene, was quiet.
The EVTA utilized the unfunded mandate of Howard Lee that stated a desire and wish for a trail to stretch across the state, the Mountain to Sea Trail (MST). Because large stretches of the trail go through private lands, it relies on easements of landowners who wish to leave a legacy by volunteering a piece of their property as a connector. In some cases, Elkin has lobbied the state to purchase land, opening it up for hikers. The MST passes near Elkin and in effect a simple but transformative decision was made to route the trail through Elkin’s main street. The resulting traffic has, over the course of 9 years, caused a complete shift. Elkin is now home to several air bnb’s, new businesses, campgrounds, and community catering to hikers who, roughly a third of the way through the trail, are ready for a shower and a beer.
The network of trails around Elkin includes urban and rural. Urban trails start with someone in an office drawing a line on a map and bringing in machinery to make an 8 foot wide trail. They do not follow the contours or other natural features and take down the hills, fill in ditches and require tons of gravel. The rural trail, by contrast, starts with numerous walk thru trips, the strategy being to take advantage of natural features. In the case of Elkin, volunteer workdays are set up to to construct a 18 to 24 inch wide trail, disturbing as little as possible. With the use of volunteers, the cost can be close to zero, in addition to creating a spirited community around the project. Elkin has both types of trails. The “in town” trail follows a flat abandoned railroad bed and is 8 feet wide topped with granite dust. For the more adventure oriented hiker, there are 15 miles of narrow rustic trails. Both serve a purpose and underscore Elkin’s dedication to making a new name for itself and a space for all kinds of hikers and outdoor enthusiasts.
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Find the full interview transcript here.
