Lack Of Hiking Trails In Ward 8 Is An Environmental Injustice, Local Group Says

Image: DCist

From DCist:

D.C.’s Ward 8 is blessed with some 500 acres of forested parkland, but there are not many ways to access those parks, with just a few miles of trails. Take, for example, Shepherd Parkway — a long strip of forest along the bluffs of Congress Heights, above where the Potomac and Anacostia Rivers meet. The forest is bordered by some two dozen blocks of row houses, apartment buildings, and an elementary school. But there is no way for residents to get into the woods. Not one trailhead. Not one tenth-mile of trail.

Like most of the forested land in Ward 8, Shepherd Parkway is owned by the National Park Service. It has been neglected for decades, a sort of dead space between the neighborhood and the lowlands below. There are a few NPS signs warning, “NO DUMPING OR LITTERING,” but otherwise, little indication that it’s a park.

“We think this is an issue of equity and environmental justice, when you have land available over here, but the park service has just never taken the initiative to actually build trails, put up signage, make it welcoming,” says Nathan Harrington, executive director of the nonprofit Ward 8 Woods Conservancy. Roughly 80% of Ward 8 residents are Black, and the ward has one of the highest poverty rates in the city.