Morrisville State College faculty, staff and students restore bridge at Callahan Brook Trail

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MORRISVILLE, NY—An audience of community members and faculty, staff and students from Morrisville State College gathered on a bridge over Callahan Brook to celebrate a project that’s been years in the making. 

Spectators were there to laud the completion and official opening of a bridge on the Callahan Brook Nature Trail, which runs through Morrisville. 

Throughout the past five years, students in Rebecca Hargrave’s Recreation Area Management classes have been restoring the bridge on the scenic trail that runs along either side of the Callahan Brook and eventually changes into the Chenango River. 

The new bridge, which offers a short, quarter-mile option for hikers, is accessible from the college’s Aquaculture Center parking lot on Eaton Street. “Ultimately, we would like to see more people use the trail,” Hargrave said. 

The full trail is almost one mile and traverses through riparian areas, fields and forests. The trail also includes wildlife viewing areas, a spur to an overlook, numerous places to sit and listen to the water and a deer exclosure, which is a fenced area that prohibits deer from getting in to browse. This allows for measurement of the effects of deer on vegetation inside and outside the area. 

This year, Hargrave’s Recreation Area Management students also repaired an eight-foot equipment bridge and replaced railings on a third bridge along the trail. 

Hargrave, assistant professor of environmental sciences, led the most recent bridge restoration with assistance and materials from other faculty and staff. The lumber for the new bridge came from trees harvested from MSC-managed forests and milled in the college’s sawmill. 

The stringers and decking planks are made from Japanese Larch, a tree valued for being strong, hard, durable and rot-resistant. The lumber is in demand for building yachts and small boats, as well as railroad ties, mine timbers, telephone poles, cabinets and fencing. 

Restoring the bridge offered MSC students valuable field experience. 

Zach Davis, a natural resources conservation student from Angola, was among those who saw the project to fruition this semester. 

“The hands-on aspect of the natural resource conservation program opened my eyes to what I want to do specifically,” said Davis, who is planning a career with the Department of Environmental Conservation (DEC). 

“Professor Hargrave taught me a lot about the architecture of bridges—which type of bridge should go in specific locations,” he said. “I have learned so many things that will be useful in a future career.” 

Natural resources conservation student Tyler Kulikowski, of Bath, plans to be a DEC officer someday. His participation in the project augmented his repertoire of skills.

Also rounding out his experience was an internship he completed at Wagner Lumber in Owego over the summer. 

“The internship provided me the chance to do everything the company does, including working in the shop, in the mill and doing forest work,” Kulikowski said. 

That hands-on approach at MSC is producing graduates who are job-ready.

“Morrisville has a proud history of combining classroom instruction with hands-on experiential learning,” said MSC President David Rogers. “Our academic program requirements, which involve full-semester internships, represent an extension of that history of applied learning.”

Morrisville State College’s curricula are enriched with applied learning and pave the way for opportunity at both the Morrisville and Norwich campuses. An action-oriented, interactive learning lab, the college is a national leader in technology and has been lauded for its exemplary, innovative and effective community service programs. 

The college was ranked among the Best Regional Colleges in the North by U.S. News and World Report Best Colleges 2017 issue and was also recognized in the Top Public Schools, Regional Colleges North in the 2017 Best Colleges rankings.