River camping
By Ethan Smith
Published in News on September 30, 2015 1:46 PM
The Goldsboro Parks and Recreation department is looking to build camping platforms on the Neuse River in the upcoming months if all goes according to plan, Parks and Recreation director Scott Barnard told the city council at their last meeting.
Camping platforms are wooden structures built along river banks that allow people to rent them out in order to have places to camp overnight as they kayak or canoe down a river.
"I'd love to see these things built this winter," Barnard said. "We'd much rather be building them in the winter rather than summer. The basic ones cost less than $1,000, and the super-fancy ones are $2,000."
The idea for the platforms was born out of people participating in other programs offered by the Parks and Recreation Department.
"We started bringing some programming here a couple years ago where we took some people out on the Appalachian Trail, and we started doing the Cruise the Neuse programming as well, and we just saw light bulbs coming on," Barnard said. "Folks in our community were like, 'Gosh, you know, we like this.' With the Cruise the Neuse program we went from 50 to 100, and now I think we're approaching 200 people that participate in the program, and people keep coming to us and saying, 'We want more of this in our community.'"
In order to fund the construction of the platforms, Parks and Recreation was granted permission during the city council's last work session to co-sign onto a grant with Love A Sea Turtle -- or, Help Them L.A.S.T. -- who is applying for funds from the state for projects in North Carolina.
L.A.S.T. is based out of Greenville and is applying for $35,000 in grant funds. The grant does not require matching funds, but requires an in-kind match by way of labor that would be performed by the Parks and Recreation department.
"Right now they're seeing how many cities are interested," Barnard said. "If they make it through first round of grant applications, then they'll have to fill out an actual grant application that shows detailed locations as to where the platforms would go."
The North Carolina Mountains to Sea Trail has a river route that comes through Wayne County by way of the Neuse River, Barnard said. Therefore, people traveling that route would be looking for places to camp out for the night, and could use camping platforms.
Two possible places for the platforms to go have been identified by the city: Waynesborough Park and Cliffs of the Neuse State Park.
"Waynesborough Park already allows camping, and we had another camping anchor down there at Cliffs of the Neuse because they allow camping. We knew we had a fella in the hopper that was interested in building campgrounds down there in Seven Springs and he is now building that campground," Barnard said. "So we said, you know, we only have a few gaps to fill in for us to have a legit campable paddle trail."
If the Parks and Recreation department can secure the grant funds from L.A.S.T., it would pay for the construction materials, and the organization would provide volunteer labor to assist with construction of the platforms.
For now, the progress of the project is contingent in securing the grant funds.
"Our Friends of Greenways group is someone we would ideally tap into to provide us with additional volunteer labor, and we'd tap into the paddling community," Barnard said. "We'd try to get three or four of these things on the ground, on either public or private property if it came down to that. You know, between the city and county we both have some FEMA land on the river, so we've got some land that can't be used for very much else other than recreation, and if we can place these things a couple miles apart we would probably rent them through the Roanoke Riverkeepers' portal. They have an online reservation system that is now being used on the Roanoke, Tar, Pasquotank and Perquimans Rivers. So since that's where the paddlers are going to reserve these things already, we would just piggyback right onto that."
Barnard said rental fees would be nominal, most likely set between $20 to $40 per night per group. The platforms are able to hold approximately 15 people at a time.
"The fee itself isn't something that's going to generate a revenue stream, but it will serve as a proof of renting it and give somebody rights over it over somebody else," Barnard said.
Camping platforms aid in what is called ecotourism, which is tourism directed towards natural environments to support conservation efforts and to observe nature and wildlife in the area.
"The point of some of the things we do is not to generate revenue, it's to bring people to Goldsboro, it's to bring activities to Goldsboro for the citizens of Goldsboro so we don't have to leave our community to go and recreate," Barnard said. "The ancillary benefit in the case of this, which, in the case of sports complexes and other things, the primary benefit will be a huge revenue stream and heads in beds, but in this case we'll get an ancillary benefit where if someone is coming to Goldsboro and paddles and stays for two or three days on a platform, they'll probably get their groceries and things at the Food Lion or hit the bike shop, or a lot of people do two nights on the platform and then a third at a bed and breakfast or hotel."