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Bethel, VT
AARP Community Challenge Grant Year: 2018
Project Category: Trails
Description: Many amenities in Bethel are only accessible by car. To encourage active transportation instead, the Town created a path for walking, biking and cross-country skiing. The multiuse trail runs from the town's elementary school to the town's new outdoor recreation area. Organizers hope the new path helps residents reach several upgraded recreational facilities nearby, including a new pool house and skate park. Spurred by the pathway's popularity, the Town is exploring ways to construct connector pathways to expand the trail network. By encouraging people to walk, organizers say the multiuse path will support Bethels economy, connecting pedestrians to local businesses.
Deer Lodge, MT
AARP Community Challenge Grant Year: 2017
Project Category: Trails
Description: To give residents a new way to access Deer Lodge's commercial district, the Powell County Parks Board built a trail connector linking up a park in the town's residential area. To enable construction, the County worked with a landowner to secure a public access easement through his property. Then the County's road crew donated its time, labor and equipment to prepare the site, installing and relocating culverts. Additionally, the Board hired a contractor to build fencing along the easement, creating a border for the trail. Before, residents had to walk along a 45-mile-per-hour highway to reach businesses and the local medical center. But since construction, Deer Lodge has continued to improve its trail system, which the City has identified as an essential feature of its ongoing downtown revitalization efforts.
Bethlehem, NY
AARP Community Challenge Grant Year: 2017
Project Category: Trails
Description: As part of its efforts to bring public art to the Albany County Helderberg-Hudson Rail Trail, the Mohawk Hudson Land Conservancy created a mural along the trail in the Town of Bethlehem. Project organizers chose a local artist from a pool of applicants to paint the mural, which depicts a surreal landscape and adorns a formerly graffitied wall. Since then, the Art on the Rail Trail (ART) initiative has installed several more murals, as well as a mini art gallery and arts programming. The trail is popular with pedestrians and cyclists in warm weather and cross-county skiers and snowshoe hikers in the winter.
Nearby AARP Community Challenge Projects
Portland, OR
AARP Community Challenge Grant Year: 2024
Project Category: HomeFit Modifications
Description: This project will educate older adults about home modifications during outreach events at Portland-area senior centers, with a focus on residents who speak little or no English. ReFIT will also install grab bars in homes.
Tigard, OR
AARP Community Challenge Grant Year: 2021
Project Category: Entrepreneurship and improved economic resilience
Description: The City of Tigard hoped to create a business incubator to help local entrepreneurs test out their ideas. So the City launched its Tigard on Roll Program, purchasing two food trucks outfitted with commercial restaurant equipment. Startup food vendors can apply to lease the trucks at a reduced rate, and the City provides coaching from business advisors. The trucks -- which sit in Tigard's new Universal Plaza -- also offer an important amenity to residents of downtown. The incubator program specifically targets entrepreneurs from underrepresented communities, which it supports by reducing start-up costs and offering mentorship. Today, residents can find the trucks at a weekly farmers market and at the annual Taste of Tigard food festival.
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