Big plans ahead for Manitoba’s Crow Wing Trail
Outside drain on Crow Wing Trail where a seasonal crossing will be installed in 2015. Credit: Diane Banash
Manitoba’s historic Crow Wing Trail stretches across 192 kilometres between the municipalities of Emerson and South Winnipeg. In the 1800s, the Crow Wing Trail was used to transport goods from the Métis Red River Settlement (present-day Winnipeg) on the Red River and the Ojibwa, Dakota and Métis Crow Wing Settlement on the Mississippi River (present-day St. Paul, Minnesota).
The Crow Wing Trail Association, The East Side Road Authority (ESRA), TCT provincial partner Trails Manitoba, and the Trans Canada Trail are all contributing to the improvement of the Crow Wing Trail by way of an infrastructure project that will help Trail users enjoy an expansive view of the Trail’s floodway channel that will direct them into the floodway basin to marvel at its size and capacity. Work will include a safe seasonal crossing of an outside drain; another seasonal crossing through the floodway; as well as improving signage along the Trail. Construction will get underway this winter and an official opening is planned for late spring 2015.
This project will create a significant connection in Manitoba’s section of the Trans Canada Trail, offering safe access from the Red River North Trail through Winnipeg to Emerson and beyond.
It will also once again connect the route so many early settlers followed to help found the province of Manitoba.
Located between Saskatchewan to the west and Ontario to the east, the province of Manitoba is home to almost 1,400 kilometres of Trans Canada Trail, with only 118 remaining kilometres to connect in time for 2017, the 150th anniversary of Canadian Confederation.
