The Tri-Rivers Conservation Foundation received a $35,000 grant from the Washington County Riverboat Foundation on May 17.

The Tri-Rivers Conservation Foundation is inching closer to completing their fundraising for a trails project in Louisa County.

Foundation member Katie Hammond talks about the project, “The total cost of the project is around $450,000, and so it involves quite a bit of stuff on a two-mile section of the former Hoover Nature Trail that bisects the Chinkapin Bluffs recreation area. There’s several pieces to the puzzle, of course engineering is a big part of it, it’s right at the base up there at Chinkapin Bluffs. There’s a lot of places where there’s been erosion over the top of the trail, and so the first thing that’s going to have to happen is working to solve those erosion problems so that every time there’s a really hard rain that mud doesn’t wash across the trail.” Hammond says the second part of the project would be to resurface the trail to make it more user friendly. The third phase is to construct a trailhead where the Louisa County Fairgrounds and the Hoover Nature Trail meet. This trailhead would include an informational kiosk about the history of the area, parking, and rest areas along the trail.

The Tri-Rivers Conservation Foundation recently received a $35,000 grant from the Washington County Riverboat Foundation for this project. They have received grants from other sources like Trees Forever, and the Transportation Alternatives Program. Hammond says the foundation hopes to receive other grants and to let the project go to bid within the year.