AUGUSTA — The Department of Agriculture, Conservation and Forestry’s Bureau of Parks and Lands recently released a Land and Water Conservation Fund Outdoor Recreation Investments Map for Maine.
The map was developed in collaboration with the Maine Outdoor Heritage Fund, Maine Office of Outdoor Recreation, Maine Recreation and Park Association, Maine Department of Transportation, Appalachian Mountain Club, and The Nature Conservancy.
The map highlights investments in outdoor recreation such as trails, parks, and other projects.
“This work to inventory the full scope of the LWCF State and Local Assistance Program’s impact provides a tangible and visible way to understand the importance of this program in our work to conserve and provide access to these important lands for the benefit of the public and our state in perpetuity,” DACF Commissioner Amanda Beal said in a news release from the organization.
To check out the Outdoor Recreation Investments Map, visit maine.gov/dacf/parks.
“In Maine, the term ‘conserved lands’ most often conjures up places like Camden Hills State Park or Tumbledown Mountain. But many of our favorite playgrounds, baseball fields, and neighborhood trails are conserved lands too, and they were made possible by the LWCF,” said BPL Director Andy Cutko. “This terrific new web resource demonstrates the importance of having outdoor places a 10 or 15-minute drive from our homes.”
Two Maine Conservation Corps environmental stewards dedicated over 3,000 hours of service to creating the interactive recreation map. The process involved converting 2,700 paper records into a dynamic GIS database.
An additional position included in the recently-enacted state budget will support improvements to the map and help ensure that resources developed through the fund remain permanently available to the public.
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