Railbanking, established in 1983 as an amendment to the National Trails System Act, is the foundational law making possible thousands of miles of rail-trails nationwide. Recently, a bill was introduced in the U.S. House of Representatives that would effectively destroy the viability of railbanking going forward, resulting in fragmented and lost corridors—and poses a threat […]

Since Rails-to-Trails Conservancy’s founding, we have been the nation’s foremost—and in most cases, only—legal advocate for rail-trails in the nonprofit sector. Under the direction of Andrea Ferster, RTC’s general counsel, our legal program has participated in numerous landmark rail-trail cases and supported countless trail managers, trail advocates and their legal counsel across the United States. […]