By Posted on Posted in McAfee Knob/Triple Crown

Interim Report McAfee 8.15 IMAGEWe all love McAfee Knob. In fact, visitation has increased by 55% per year in the last four years, causing a noticeable increase in avoidable impacts such as litter, vandalism, negative encounters with wildlife, and damage to vegetation.

Enter RATC’s McAfee Knob Task Force, an all-volunteer group that helps the paid Ridgerunners with outreach, education and cleanup. While they spend a lot of time on the AT, they find that greeting hikers in the Route 311 parking lot often provides the most useful information for hikers, especially Read more »

By Posted on Posted in Mountain Valley Pipeline, RATC News Tagged with

(a full copy of the RATC’s comments to FERC on the MVP is here: RATC comments to FERC 6.11.15)

According to its bylaws, the purposes of the Roanoke Appalachian Trail Club include a duty to:

  • participate in and encourage the development of laws and regulations that protect the Appalachian Trail and its related interests
  • use all legal means to protect and defend the Appalachian Trail and its related interests

Mountain Valley Pipeline (MVP) of Pittsburg has proposed a 42-inch pipeline over 300 miles long to connect fracked natural gas fields in West Virginia to markets on the East Coast and overseas as far away as India, and the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) will decide whetherRead more »

By Posted on Posted in McAfee Knob/Triple Crown, Mountain Valley Pipeline Tagged with ,

McAfee iconicMcAfee Knob Volunteer Ridgerunners help with outreach, maintenance and parking lot patrol – more training scheduled on August 8. To sign up or get information, see the McAfee Knob MeetUp group or contact Kathryn Herndon of ATC staff at kherndon@appalachiantrail.org

McAfee Knob is popular, which is both a blessing and a curse. Every weekend hundreds of day hikers and quite a few backpackers head for the Knob. Two wonderful paid Ridgerunners – Stephanie Breig and Eric West –take turns patrolling the section from Dragon’s Tooth to Lambert’s Meadow on weekends, but they can’t be everywhere.

That is where the volunteers come in. Read more »