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When Anchorage officials and outdoor recreation advocates gathered Saturday to ceremoniously mark the start of construction for a 1.3-mile section of trail near the city’s industrial port, they said they were taking a small step toward a big vision.

The connector will close a gap in the city’s existing network of paved bike trails and, supporters hope, eventually be part of what they call the “Alaska Long Trail,” an interlaced network spanning 500 miles from Fairbanks to Seward.

Anchorage Mayor Suzanne LaFrance characterized the Long Trail as a “dream trail connecting Seward to Fairbanks that will most definitely, most definitely, swing through downtown Anchorage.”

“Our parks and trails are the crown jewels of our community,” she said at the ceremony.

Supporters say trail expansions and improvements offer a big payoff to residents and to the economy, helping to diversify tourism activity that is otherwise highly dependent on the cruise ship industry.

The new trail connection is to include a plaza dedicated to Dena’ina heritage tied to Ship Creek, which in that Indigenous language is called Dgheyaytnu, meaning Stickleback Creek.

Farther south along the 500-mile corridor, another incremental step toward the Alaska Long Trail goal was completed last fall.

A new trail stretch at Moose Pass, a Kenai Peninsula community of about 225, offers a potentially unbroken hiking route down to Seward, about 30 miles to the south.

The work, funded by the U.S. Forest Service, includes six miles of new trail along what is the historic Iditarod Trail route that was used in Gold Rush and territorial days for travel between Seward and Nome.

The work also includes four miles of improved trail and two new bridges, said Jane Boer, the Alaska Long Trail officer at the nonprofit organization Alaska Trails.

Boer described the work in a progress report on the Alaska Long Trail that she delivered last Friday at the annual Statewide Trails conference held in Anchorage and hosted by Alaska Trails.

“I think it’s really exciting that there’s a new trail down there, new adventures to be had,” she said.

Economic aspects of trails

To supporters, the trails that wind through Anchorage and other communities enhance quality of life and, in the longer run, the economy.

State Rep. Zach Fields, D-Anchorage, who rode to the Saturday groundbreaking ceremony with his daughter Zara on an e-bike, is among the supporters.

“Trails are Anchorage’s competitive advantage,” Fields said at the event. “I think we all appreciate that they’re amazing for our quality of life because they’re the single most important thing we can do to become more competitive in a global economy.”

Trails also support an aspect of the tourism industry that is independent of cruise ship companies.

“It’s independent travelers who spend more money and stay longer,” said Haley Johnston, executive director of Alaska Trails.

The Alaska tourism industry’s dependence on cruise ships is evident in visitor statistics from the state’s national parks.

It took until last year for visitation to Alaska’s eight national parks to recover from big losses inflicted by the COVID-19 pandemic, which in turn depressed cruise travel, according to a new report in Alaska Economic Trends, the monthly magazine of the Alaska Department of Labor and Workforce Development.

In 2020, the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic – and a year when summer cruise travel virtually stopped – visitor numbers at Alaska’s eight national parks nose-dived by 86% in 2020. That compared to a 28% average drop across the country for national park visitation, according to the analysis.

The contrast was striking, said Karinne Wiebold, the state economist who wrote the article.

In the Lower 48, where national parks are within driving distance for most visitors, those lands became something like havens for people who wanted to recreate safely.

“For people it became a really enjoyable way to travel and be outside,” Wiebold said. But that social distancing did not work for people trying to travel to Alaska. “But when you come to Alaska, you’re not in a bubble.”

Much of the statewide trend has been driven by visitation at Glacier Bay National Park, which is visited almost entirely by cruise ship, and Denali National Park, which is a major destination for cruise passengers who add train or bus trips to their itineraries.

While visitation has returned to pre-pandemic levels, National Park Service employment is now well below that, despite a rebound that started in 2021, according to the analysis.

Trump administration cuts brought National Park Service employment down to 784 in 2025 from 865 the year before. In 2019, prior to the pandemic, Alaska had 869 park service jobs. The jobs support operations in all of Alaska’s National Park Service units, which include national preserves, national monuments, historical parks and other protected areas as well as the eight national parks.

The administration is proposing more cuts to both funding and employment. The budget it has proposed for the coming fiscal year would cut National Park Service employment in 2027 by more than 30% from 2025 levels.

Mixed prospects for future trail funding

The most recent trail connections and improvements have been paid for by a combination of federal, state, local and private funds.

The Moose Pass-area projects, which are in the Chugach National Forest, were the beneficiary of about $12 million in federal appropriations secured over three fiscal years by Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska, according to Alaska Trails.

The Ship Creek project, tentatively estimated to cost $19 million, is being paid for by a variety of sources, including federal transportation funds, state funds and local park bonds approved in recent years by Anchorage voters.

Over three budget cycles, the state has put over $6.7 million into Alaska Long Trail projects, according to Alaska Trails.

The concept of a “world-class trail” on par with the Appalachian and Pacific Crest trails continues to have lawmakers’ support, said Sen. Bill Wielechowski, D-Anchorage.

“I can’t emphasize enough how excited we are about the Long Trail,” Wielechowski said at the groundbreaking ceremony. “Every year in the legislature we’ve been trying to put a little bit more, a little bit more, towards it to build that out.”

There are no projects specific to the Alaska Long Trail in the 2027 fiscal year capital budget currently pending in the legislature, though there are several individual trail-related items.

The pending operating budget does propose an increase in funding for the state Division of Parks and Outdoor Recreation, which could benefit trail users. The budget passed by the legislature last year appropriated $23.9 million; after Dunleavy’s vetoes, the amount was whittled to $21.8 million. The new operating budget that lawmakers are now crafting for the coming fiscal year puts funding for the division at $27.7 million.

Along with the Forest Service, there are numerous sources of federal funds for Alaska trail projects, such as those available from the Department of the Interior under the Great American Outdoors Act. However, budget cuts may have closed off one of those federal opportunities.

Among the Trump administration cuts to the National Park Service was the elimination of the two positions administering the service’s Rivers, Trails and Conservation Assistance Program in Alaska.

The program assists locally led conservation and outdoor recreation projects, including trail construction and maintenance. In the past, the program supported projects around the state, from Prince of Wales Island in the southernmost part of Southeast to Nome on the Bering Sea coast.

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