East End Trails Fund

Through proper design and management, trails can have a positive impact on the environment and the community. Trails show us where to go. They guide visitors through open spaces, protecting the most ecologically sensitive areas from unnecessary foot traffic while highlighting spectacular viewsheds and creating educational opportunities.

Trails tell a story. Signage along the accessible trail system at the Trust’s Wolf and Reese preserves introduces visitors to the native plants and animals that call these woods and wetlands home. The winding trails of the High Point, Silver Beech, and Red Dirt preserves highlight the uniquely beautiful topography of the North Amagansett hills. They take visitors through a rare landscape that looks about the same today as it did 100, or even 1,000 years ago.

Most of all, trails teach us all to be better stewards of the land. The reality is that people will access our natural areas – even if they are not open to the public. Journalist and author Robert Moor puts it succinctly, “Trails efficiently allow us to visit the wilderness without trampling it all to dust.” Our trails help guide visitors through natural areas – directing their feet along the paths we want them to go while allowing them to see, hear, and ultimately connect with the outdoors.

By providing public access to preserves across the East End, we invite members of our community to see and understand what is here – and then become stewards themselves. But we can’t do it without you. Make a gift to the East End Trails Fund today!

See what other organizations have to say about the importance of trails and how they can benefit us all!

American Trails – How Trails Benefit the Environment

New York-New Jersey Trail Conference – Why We Build Trails

Rails to Trails Conservancy – Benefits of Trails

Yale Environment Review – Designing More Sustainable Trails

From Smithtown to Orient, Quogue to Amagansett, the Trust has helped conserve more than 20 preserves with public access trails. Check out the full list here and get ready to hit the trails!

Gifts to the East End Trails Fund will help us maintain these trails so that they can continue to be enjoyed by all.

In October 2023, we opened the Trust's first public trail in the Town of Riverhead. The trail begins right off Sound Avenue and runs north through the Granttham Preserve, offering scenic views of historic farm fields and the agricultural landscape so central to the Town’s character. The trail ends in a loop through a spectacular meadow located on our adjacent Reeve Preserve – great for spotting our native wildlife and migrating birds.

Since 2019, the Trust has been working with Cornell Cooperative Extension and the Peconic Estuary Program to restore and protect this 2.4-acre parcel on Greenport Harbor. As we continue to improve the living shoreline along the waterfront at Widow’s Hole, we look forward to creating an educational and interpretive trail that will highlight – and protect – the native ecosystem that has been so carefully restored.

Once the largest unprotected, undeveloped parcel in the Peconic Bay Estuary, this nearly 100-acre waterfront parcel was preserved by the Trust on December 31, 2021. We’re working on a management plan for Broad Cove that will protect the 25-acres of tidal wetlands and 8,000 feet of shoreline while providing public access to this beautiful place.

Gifts to the East End Trails Fund will help us open these preserves for public access in responsible and sustainable ways!