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Slip Closes St. Clairsville Bike Trail

Photo Provided Mud and debris blocks the front of the northern end of the St. Clairsville bicycle trail after Saturday night’s heavy rain caused a land slide. City employees have been hauling debris away. The trail is expected to reopen today.

St. Clairsville’s bicycle trail was closed during the weekend and Memorial Day after Saturday’s heavy rainfall made a bad situation worse and sent mud and debris to block the northern side of the trail.

City officials said they expect the trail to be reopenned at the tunnel by this evening at the latest.

“The slip was Saturday night into Sunday and it was on the north side of the bike trail,” said Mayor Terry Pugh. “It was a mudslide and some small trees. We closed it on Sunday and Monday, unfortunately. (City employees) started work first thing (Tuesday) morning.”

Dump trucks and a backhoe were on the scene Tuesday clearing the mud away. Service and Safety Director Jim Zucal said a total of 30 truckloads of mud and debris were transported from the scene, with trucks from various departments with a capacity of 1 ton or more.

Pugh said once the mud is cleared, the city will install ditches on either side of the tunnel entrance to collect falling debris.

“You hope you don’t get that kind of rain again,” he said. “In a normal rain, you don’t shouldn’t get any real runoff of mud. When do you get that kind of rainfall? I think the last time I remember rain like that was 2004 … The other thing that’s added to it is those trees get bigger and bigger so you’re adding more and more weight anywhere on this hillside. They work fine for erosion until the dirt around the trees start to erode.”

Pugh said the situation is common in eastern Ohio, where much of the ground is clay sitting on sandstone.

“And it slips off,” he said. “And there’s this crazy weather. We don’t have normal weather: it goes from one extreme to the next extreme.”

To some extent, the situation is not surprising because the city has been aware of the condition of the bike trail for a long time.

“This has been on our radar,” said Zucal. “We knew there was overhanging rock, debris and some trees that could come down with that. Belmont County has had a unique situation this winter and spring and summer. We’re getting a lot of rain and a lot of moisture and the ground’s saturated.”

Pugh pointed out that the slip occurred at the hillside above the north entrance to the tunnel, which has been evaluated for a long-term upgrade project. Earlier this month, the city applied for grant of about $40,000 from the Ohio Department of Natural Resources to address upgrading the tunnel. This would be only one part of the first phase, which would call for $80,000 to $100,000 from various possible sources, such as the Ohio Department of Transportation, to remove overhanging trees and unstable rock and soil.

“We’ve applied for one bit of grant funding to work on both sides of the tunnel, but especially the north,” Pugh said. “We’re trying to do it in stages.”

The overall total cost is estimated at close to $800,000.

“We’re going to have to do it to keep the bike trail open,” said Pugh. “It’s going to be a necessity. We’re going to make sure it’s safe, No. 1.”

Zucal said the recent slip will be included in the grant application as evidence of the need.

The tunnel was built in the early 1900s and was renovated in the 1940s and again in 2015.

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