PITTSTON ACADEMY GRANT – Snowmobilers traveling the Moosehead Lake snowmobile circuit this winter will find a different route from Pittston to Seboomook Township.

To accommodate its cutting operations on the Seboomook Road, Wagner Forest Management closed off about 14 miles of the old trail and constructed a new snowmobile route this fall.

Ken Twitchell, owner of Pittston Farm and a trail groomer, said Tuesday that the forest management company cut a 20-foot-wide swath through the woods a short distance from the old trail. Transforming the path into a snowmobile trail was left to the members of the Pittston Snowmobile Club.

An excavator paid for by Twitchell and a bulldozer funded by the snowmobile club have done as much as possible in removing stumps, rocks and brush. But he said another $20,000 to $30,000 worth of work is needed to bring the new trail up to the excellent conditions the old trail offered.

Twitchell said a grant for federal funds will be submitted this week to help toward that end. Organizers have obtained letters of support from local chambers of commerce, from municipal and county officials and from the legislative delegation.

Although there is much work left to be done on the trail, Twitchell said snowmobilers will find good riding but not as good has it used to be. He said the trail was finished only late this fall, which didn’t allow much time to prepare the trail. Volunteers, however, are working as much as possible to level off the rough spots and to shape the trail.

“We hope it will be ready to go when we get enough snow to groom,” Twitchell said.

During the winter, several hundred snowmobiles a day travel the lake trail through Pittston, according to Twitchell.

He said the local club maintains about 40 miles of the trail from Pittston to Northeast Carry and the connecting trail to Rockwood. The federal funds would help hasten the pace of improvements to the trail, he said.