Support the Pisgah Hill Campaign

Community Conservation in New Gloucester

New Gloucester and surrounding communities are at a crossroads.  Draw a triangle connecting Portland, Lewiston-Auburn, and Brunswick and you encompass one of Maine's fastest growing regions. And while pressure for residential development has eased with the stalled economy, it will surely return. We have all witnessed the conversion of farm- and forestland to suburbia. It is a slow erosion of our quality of place.

If current rates of sprawl continue unchecked, open fields, expansive woodlands, and many of their non-human residents will be lost forever. Growth is desirable, but not at the expense of a community's important natural assets.

The growing Pisgah Hill Conservation Area presents an outstanding opportunity to protect a significant portion of our changing landscape. Demarcating a stretch of New Gloucester's eastern boundary between North Pownal Road and Dougherty Road, the seven parcels comprising the project total more than 243 acres and include the second highest point in New Gloucester.   We acquired or placed easements on 176 of these acres during 2010 and 2011, and have more progress with private landowners planned for 2012.   This project also provides the possibility of trail links and loops between Bradbury Mountain State Park and Pineland Public Reserve Lands Unit and the potential to protect a larger block of undeveloped land stretching north to Runaround Pond.

A growing number of area residents have signed onto this project because it will:

� Be open to the public for various types of recreation

� Link neighboring conservation lands and trails

� Set aside over 200 acres of prime wildlife habitat

� Protect several large deer wintering areas

� Conserve one of the highest points in New Gloucester

� Secure the heart of a large block of undeveloped land

� Open up additional conservation corridor opportunities

In July 2008 RRCT received a $266,000 grant from the Land for Maine's Future, supporting all progress to date. This important award launched our campaign and allows us to act on this once in a lifetime opportunity. We are hard at work to find local support and funding to complete this project in 2012, and to begin trail construction on key parcels during the summer of 2012 with more trail construction in future years