Making the Most of Opportunities

Collaborate: The only way that the original trail succeeded was through the collaboration of multiple jurisdictions, organizations, and individuals. As the Seaway Trail has expanded to its full 500-mile length across New York and Pennsylvania, collaborations have developed between the two states, among various public and private entities, and with several federal agencies and departments. Overall success has come about largely through these cooperative efforts.

Find the Fit between the Community and Tourism: Towns and hamlets all along the Seaway Trail embraced tourism from both pride and economic standpoints. For communities that thought they had nothing to offer visitors, the trail emboldened them to turn to their natural and manmade histories and develop tourism infrastructure as well as attractions. In Sackets Harbor, new restaurants and shops handle the influx of visitors.

Make Sites and Programs Come Alive: Activities that celebrate the trail’s natural wonders, such as fishing, boating, agritourism and bird watching, are enhanced by Seaway Trail guidebooks. While at the many historic sites along the route, interpreters and reenactors demonstrate 18th and 19th century ways of life, ranging from Colonial infantry drills to 19th century style gardening.

Focus on Quality and Authenticity: The Seaway Trail contains myriad authentic resources from coastal wildlife habitats to scenic vistas, forests to farms, and historic architecture to cultural activities from a diverse international population. From marketing materials and trailblazing signs to official guidebooks and Journey, the trail’s annual periodical, the Seaway Trail’s assets are represented to the public with excellence.

Preserve and Protect Resources: By drawing attention to the area's vast natural and manmade resources, Seaway Trail has urged and promoted their preservation. Public and private organizations and individual citizens all along the 454-mile trail in New York have taken measures to preserve and protect resources ranging from lighthouses to wildlife refuges, and War of 1812 forts to swamps and wetlands. Leading by example, the Seaway Trail undertook the rehabilitation of the 1817 Union Hotel in Sackets Harbor's main square for use as offices and an information center.