Acadia's Great Meadow: rebuilding trails so a wetland can breathe

The Great Meadow, near Sieur de Monts Spring in Acadia National Park, Maine, is a wetland that has been drowning in the wrong places. Trails and roads built across it block the streams that should wander through it, so water backs up and floods the paths instead of spreading evenly through the meadow. Acadia is rebuilding the trails to let the water through, as part of a larger project to restore the wetland.

Floodwater over the Great Meadow and the woods around it after heavy rain and snowmelt, March 2023. Patrick Kark, NPS

Why the trails flood

A healthy wetland lets water and streams meander naturally and spread out in every direction. Around Sieur de Monts, footpaths and roads cut across that flow, and the result is intense flooding in some spots.

On flat, low ground, repeated flooding does real damage. Water softens the gravel tread of a trail and loosens it. It damages the trail's edges and the plants beside them — and hikers make that worse by stepping off the path to get around the wet, broken sections. The goal is to restore the streams' connections so water flows where it should, keep the trails open to walkers, and ready the area for the heavier, more frequent storms that climate projections suggest. Native plants are being restored alongside the trail work.

Hemlock Road: eighteen new culverts

The southern half of the Hemlock Road trail is one of the worst spots. Streams running off Dorr Mountain have to cross the trail eastward to reach the meadow, and the rusted metal culverts meant to carry them are too small.

• The old pipes will be replaced by box culverts with wooden decks and natural stream beds, built to blend into the landscape. On the northern section they will match the culverts already on the northern part of the Jesup Path.
• At one spot the water already runs over and under the trail in every rain — joining one stream to the wetland, but washing out the path and making it impassable. A larger wooden box culvert there will carry the stream underneath while walkers cross on top.
• In all, 18 new culverts will go in along Hemlock Road.

When it rains, water floods the spillway on Hemlock Road, making the trail impassable and damaging it. NPS

The spillway will be replaced with a box culvert that keeps the water moving and the trail open. NPS

Great Meadow Loop: closing the gaps

North of the Jesup Path and Hemlock Road, across the Park Loop Road, is the Great Meadow Loop. Gaps between the two trail systems push walkers onto the road shoulder, close to traffic. Working with the town of Bar Harbor, the park plans to join them up:

1. Extend the Great Meadow Loop to meet the ends of the Jesup Path and Hemlock Road on the south side of the Park Loop Road.
2. Continue east beside the road to the Great Meadow vista, with railings to keep feet off the plants there.
3. Cross back over the Park Loop Road and head north toward Bar Harbor.

Every crossing of the Park Loop Road will get a crosswalk. The result should be a trail system that is easier for everyone to use, safer, and better connected to town.

Sources

Written from "Upgrading Trails to Help the Great Meadow," Acadia National Park, National Park Service, a work of the United States government in the public domain.