Durham residents fond of walking along Long Marsh Road but tired of trudging through the mud may find relief. The town was recently awarded a $7,940 grant from the New Hampshire Department of Resources and Economic Development Trail Bureau to improve the portion of the trail between Route 108 and Durham Point Road.

“It’s a really cool nature preserve kind of thing, but you need big boots to get through there,” says Town Council chair Neil Niman.

The town applied for the DRED grant in January.

“It was a learning experience,” says Jane Crooks, a member of the Parks and Recreation Commission who wrote the grant proposal—her first—and played an important role in pushing the project through.

Trail improvements come in the form of rustic bridges called puncheon bridges, which are cedar logs laid in the mud then overlaid with planks of another type of wood, which is yet to be determined for this locale. Crooks says this type of bridge will allow easier access to the area while leaving the surrounding plant and wildlife—including beaver and osprey—relatively undisturbed. She estimates that the bridge portion of the trail will be 400 feet long. The trail begins at the beaver dams at the end of Longmarsh Road, then continues for close to a mile through a mixture of woodland and wetland until it hooks up with Durham Point Road.

The grant covers the cost of material and two days’ worth of labor from Durham’s public works department. Volunteers will be required to finish the work.

“Most people are for it,” says Crooks. “I don’t think we’ll have a problem getting volunteers.”

At the Durham Town Council meeting Monday, July 17, the council officially accepted the DRED grant. Crooks says she hopes work on the bridge portion of the trail will begin in September and be completed by mid-October.