Hanover Trolley Trail Grows By 2 Miles.

“NEEDED NOW MORE THAN EVER”
 
SEVEN VALLEYS, PA –
York County Rail Trail Authority will open two more miles of the Hanover Trolley Trail on April 26, 2024 and swing into construction for another one-mile section during the coming year. These projects will close the gaps between existing sections of the Trolley Trail in Hanover and Spring Grove, with the goal to provide county residents with a rail trail experience complementing the very popular Heritage Rail Trail.

This new section of trail links in Spring Grove to Borough Park and extends eastward along a dormant rail line purchased by the authority in 2020. Along the way, the trail section passes through woodland and agricultural lands, and offers views of Codorus Creek. Authority executive director Gwen Loose explains, “These new miles of trail offer visitors great connections to businesses in the borough and exceptional views of open spaces.”
Funding for this expansion of the Hanover Trolley Trail was made possible through state grants from the PA Department of Conservation & Natural Resource’s Keystone Fund and the Department of Community & Economic Development’s Local Share Account with matching local funds from Memorial Health Fund and Explore York. Authority chairman Frank Kempf added, “With a current construction cost of approximately $800,000 per mile, these funding partners are critical to the pace of our trail-building work and our ability to offer the public new miles to explore.” trail work has become more and more dependent on
 
The public is invited to a ceremony on April 26, 2024 at 11:30 AM celebrating the completion of this phase of the Hanover Trolley Trail. The ceremony will be held on the trail approximately 0.5 miles from Borough Park, 210 E Railroad Street, Spring Grove, PA. Parking is available along Railroad Street.

PROJECT BACKGROUND
In 2020, the authority purchased 8.5 miles of dormant rail line located between Hanover and the village of Bair in West Manchester Township and embarked on an estimated $14 million project to expand and complete the Hanover Trolley Trail. Originally envisioned in the 1970s to share occupancy with a sixteen-mile Met-Ed utility corridor, the Trolley Trail now has a parallel corridor that offers many advantages for trail development. Soon after the rail purchase, the authority salvaged the rails and began an aggressive trail construction plan.
With the rail corridor purchase also came the challenge of restoring adjacent portions of Oil Creek, an impaired tributary of Codorus Creek. Phase 1 of this work began in mid-April, and will be followed by additional trail construction in Heidelberg Township.