Five miles north of Moscow proper, taking a turn off Highway 95, there sits a unique recreation area focused on leisure activities and youth known as Virgil Phillips Farm.
In early March, Moscow City Council passed a resolution to construct a new trail in this park, according to past reporting from The Argonaut. While the trail does allow for mountain biking, those involved say it is a multiuse trail, not primarily for mountain biking.
The area this plan will take effect on, Virgil Phillips Farm, is owned by the city of Moscow. Virgil Phillips, the original owner, bequeathed the park to the city “for the benefit and use of the children of Moscow for recreation purposes,” the city website states.
While the city owns the park, they do not maintain it. Because the farm was donated with children and community engagement in mind, several organizations throughout the years have stepped in to fulfill the purpose.
Latah County Parks Director Andy Grant said when the city first received the land, they leased it out to a farmer, using proceeds to fund recreational programs. In the 1990s, a group of citizens wanted to directly fulfill the mission of the land and formed Better living Inc. They took over maintenance and worked to develop youth programs on the property. Then in the 2000s, Better Living Inc. continued their efforts, Latah County Parks and Recreation took over the duties and currently maintain the land.
The county maintains it for efficiency, Grant said. It is not efficient for the city’s parks and recreation department to maintain city parks and then travel five miles north to Virgil Phillips Farm.
Grant said any development of the park is still focused on a central theme of open and natural space, only adding trails and parking.
Alongside the maintenance provided by Latah County Parks and Recreation, a non-profit volunteer organization called Friends of Phillips Farm was formed to encourage use and develop programs for the park.
President of Friends of Phillips Farm Martha Lovett said one current program is for wetland restoration. This program’s goal is to remove non-native reed canary grasses and replace it with native grasses. Lovett said the goal is “just return it to the way it would be naturally.”
In early February, several Facebook users commented on a post from Moscow-Pullman Daily News about the new trail and expressed concerns for the impact it would have.
One user said the area near Moscow Mountain’s headwater trail is overloaded already. They said the parking section of Foothill Road is overcrowded on weekends. Another user worried mountain biking would take away from the leisurely activities of the park.
“We want to stress that it is a multiuse trail,” Lovett said. “It’s not a mountain biking trail.”
The plan was always presented as multiuse, not as a mountain biking trail, Lovett said. What has stuck in the headlines and in concerns brought up was this being just a mountain biking trail. As for the rest of the park, it will remain hiking only.
The mountain biking aspect of the new trail is only “suitable for beginner mountain bikers to gain skill and confidence riding while learning about trail etiquette and responsible trail use,” the new trail’s proposal states.
The organization that brought forth this plan, the Moscow Area Mountain Biking Association, known as MAMBA, also maintains the trails of Moscow Mountain. Moscow Mountain is almost entirely privately owned, and MAMBA has built relationships with the private owners of the area to allow recreation.
“With any new trail or project, concerns always come up of how it will affect the current use of the trails,” Sandra Townsend, MAMBA board member, stated in an email.
Virgil Phillips Farm does not get a concerning amount of use, according to Grant.
“It gets a fair amount of use but it’s not super busy,” Grant said. “The uses tend to be spread out a little more.”
Grant said he was not aware of any complaints from residents and did not think the new trail will have a significant impact on maintenance.
“Usually new trails help to disperse use, not compound it,” Townsend stated. “We want to make sure that everyone understands that we want to build in a sustainable manner.”
Other than the Facebook comments, Townsend stated they had an overwhelmingly positive response to the new trail and heard no other complaints.
“I want to emphasize that trail building takes time,” Townsend stated. “While the project has been approved, it will take some time to get all the logistics in place to start to build the trail.”
There is not yet an opening date for the trail.
Cody Roberts can be reached at [email protected] @uidaho.edu or on Twitter @CodyRobReports