A journey that started more than 20 years ago could finally be nearing the finish line, as project partners on the Sleeping Bear Heritage Trail prepare to start work on the ninth and final segment of the 26-mile trail route. But recent pushback from a local neighborhood group has reignited old debates about the trail and its environmental impacts. Could the renewed controversy change the final plans for the trail? The Leelanau Ticker checked in with project leaders to find out.

Back in 2002, the State of Michigan designated the Leelanau Scenic Heritage Route Committee “to promote measures which preserve and enhance the scenic, historical, and recreational characteristics of Michigan Highways 22, 109, and 204 as they traverse the rural countryside and unique villages of Leelanau County, including Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore.” The committee comprised representatives “from all 12 townships and villages” along the route, as well as stakeholders from Michigan Department of Transportation (MDOT), the National Park Service (NPS), the Grand Traverse Band of Ottawa and Chippewa Indians, and others.

In 2005, the committee suggested the non-motorized trail concept that eventually became the Sleeping Bear Heritage Trail. Years of study, review, and public visioning followed, before the partners – chief among them NPS, MDOT, and TART Trails – settled upon a 26-mile route that would allow cyclists, runners, and other trail users to travel from Empire all the way to Good Harbor Beach. Construction on phase one kicked off in 2011, and on June 20, 2012, the first 4.25-mile span – between Glen Arbor and the Dune Climb – opened.

Fast-forward to 2024, and 21 of the Heritage Trail’s planned 26 miles are officially on the ground. The main piece remaining is the so-called “Segment 9,” a 4.25-mile stretch from the trail’s current stopping point at Bohemian Road to its long-planned northern terminus at Good Harbor Trail. Scott Tucker, superintendent of Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore, says the project partners “are in the final phases of that design, and construction could start soon as this fall.”

Those plans got a rebuke last month when a local property owners group called the Little Traverse Lake Association (LTLA) released the results of an environmental impact study it had commissioned. Performed by Borealis Consulting LLC of Traverse City, the study found that Segment 9 would involve removing nearly 7,300 trees and routing trail through sensitive ecosystems.

“Three and half miles (85%) of the trail is within protected Critical Dune Area, including barrier dune and wooded dune and swale complex, vulnerable communities in the State of Michigan,” the Borealis report reads. “The trail also crosses regulated wetlands near rare, threatened, or endangered species habitat. Because of this, it is recommended that an Environmental Assessment (EA) is done on the impact of the route that this trail takes and in comparison to other potential routes.”

As is required by the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA), the NPS commissioned EAs of the Sleeping Bear Heritage Trail in the late 2000s before any construction. The first EA was part of an initial 2008 trail plan, which drew significant public feedback and criticism – including from the Little Traverse Lake Property Owners Association, the group now known as LTLA. Based on that feedback, the NPS issued a revised plan and EA in March 2009, which modified several trail segments, including Segment 9. That plan drew less public pushback, and the NPS ultimately signed off on the EA with a “Finding of No Significant Impact” (FONSI), clearing the way for the project to proceed.

The LTLA unsuccessfully sued the NPS in 2015 over alleged NEPA violations, including that the 2009 EA was incomplete and inadequate. The LTLA wanted a botanical study of the route – a meticulous inventorying process that assesses plant species and ecosystems – which they said was not included.

“Since we were not able to answer [botanical survey] questions from what has been published to date, the Association took on the task of inventorying the trees and species along the Segment 9 path,” the LTLA stated last month. “The consulting botanist did an actual tree count and inventory of species and ecosystems along a route staked and flagged by OHM Consultants last year on behalf of NPS.”

The botanical survey determined that the construction of Segment 9 will require the removal of nearly 7,300 trees, among other impacts to vulnerable ecosystems. Based on those findings, the LTLA is urging Heritage Trail partners to conduct a new full-scale EA of the route – and to consider other routes with less environmental impact.

“Little Traverse Lake residents have suggested in the past that the Heritage Trail users could access Good Harbor Bay by simply extending the trail north along Bohemian Road (CR 669), which they have claimed would avoid the sensitive ecological areas, keep thousands of trees, save millions of dollars, avoid private property, and utilize an existing parking area with beach picnic and restroom facilities,” states a press release from another group of Little Traverse Lake homeowners.

The LTLA’s botanical study has triggered a renewed bout of discussion and media coverage around the Heritage Trail, including a report last month in the Detroit Free Press. But when asked if the study or the response around it might motivate a change in plans for Segment 9, Tucker holds firm.

“It hasn't changed the conversation,” Tucker tells the Leelanau Ticker. “There were no surprises in the study. Back in 2009, we followed a very prescriptive process for an EA, as outlined by the NEPA. That process was followed to a T.”

Tucker pushes back against one claim from critics: that the 2009 EA predicted zero impact to wetlands, streams and creeks, topography, wildlife and vegetation along the Segment 9 route.

“The EA did not say there would be no impacts; it said there would be impacts, but the NPS ultimately found that they were not significant impacts,” Tucker explains. “When it comes to trail building, the only non-impact is to not build. But we are a land management agency, and our job is to balance out recreation and visitor access with resource preservation. I believe this project has been very successful on all accounts, and that the first 21 miles are a good benchmark of both the demand for the trail and our sustainability and sensitivity to the landscape.”

Pictured: A map of the planned Segment 9 route.

Correction: An earlier version of this story incorrectly attributed one key statement, about potentially routing of the Sleeping Bear Heritage Trail along Bohemian Road to access Good Harbor Bay, to the Little Traverse Lake Association. This statement was in fact taken from a press release sent to the Leelanau Ticker by a smaller, less formal, and unnamed group of Little Traverse Lake residents. The article has been corrected to reflect this different source.