Eastern Ontario snowmobilers welcome money to reopen closed trails

There's guarded optimism among eastern Ontario snowmobilers over the province's promise to put $3.9 million toward restoring the trail network.

Last week, the province said it would be providing the Ontario Federation of Snowmobile Clubs (OFSC) with the money to enable "the full reopening of 4,500 kilometres of trails" this winter.

The federation had planned to cut its network significantly due to operational costs that had risen steadily over the past five years, according to John Van Lane, governor of the Upper Canada Snowmobile Region.

Van Lane told CBC Radio's Ottawa Morning late last month that grooming the trails made up the biggest portion of that cost.

On Sunday, he said that although it would be a challenge to get every closed trail open, the eleventh-hour provincial funding was welcome.

"The reduction of trails [was] hurting a lot of our points of interest, including gas stations, restaurants, hotels. It would have trickled down," he said.

LISTEN | More on the planned cuts before this funding:

The Beautiful Eastern Association of Snowmobile Trails club, meanwhile, had closed roughly 80 kilometres of trail in and around the Carleton Place and Smiths Falls areas.

Club president Chris Angell said that had the province announced the funding two months ago, it would have prevented any of those closures.

"Our plan is to open up as much as we can for this season," Angell said.

"But the truth of the matter is we're not going to hit everything, and it'll likely be next season before we're able to be in the 80-to-100-per cent range that we were previously."

According to the OFSC, the latest money comes on top of a previous $1-million infrastructure investment from the province to keep Ontario's more than 30,000 kilometres of trails in working order.

"Looking beyond this season, this investment represents the first step in plans that will ensure the long-term sustainability of a trail network of this size in Ontario," the OFSC said in a statement.