Sleeping Bear Heritage Trail work halted

EMPIRE - It's a project that was more than a decade in the making, and it's not known if it will ever pick back up again.

More than ten years of work and millions of dollars spent, but it didn't come without continuous meetings with the Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians, objections from the Northern Michigan Environmental Action Council, The National Parks Conservation Association, The Cleveland Township Board and locals.

The problem, four and a quarter miles of trail slated to run from Bohemian Road to Good Harbor Trail.

Building the last few miles of the trail, called segment nine, is now halted.

Here's the reason, In a statement dating back to August, Grand Traverse Band Tribal chairwoman Sandra Witherspoon voiced concerns to the Lakeshore superintendent Scott Tucker.

"Our opposition is grounded in serious concerns regarding the potential impacts on wetlands, tree removal, and the treaty gathering rights of our tribal members.

Moreover, the proposed extension encroaches upon areas protected under treaty rights that guarantee our tribal members the ability to gather resources."

Tucker said there were 15 meetings to discuss the continuation of the trail, but ultimately a decision was made to stop the continuation of the project.

"The core piece of this Sleeping Bear decision focuses on the inherent, responsibility I have as a superintendent of these public lands and these ancestral lands of the Grand Traverse Band, and the responsibility that Sleeping Bear Dunes has to honor the treaty rights, and the ancestral knowledge of the Grand Traverse Band on their ancestral homelands."

Tucker said the pause is indefinite and the park is planning multiple other projects.