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Dedicated volunteers maintain provincial park near Turner Valley

The 300 Group Trail Maintenance Association maintains Brown-Lowery Provincial Park year-round, relying on volunteers and donations.

Hiking trail maintenance is probably not top of mind for most trail users, until they come across a fallen tree blocking a pathway or an old footbridge that looks like the weight of a fly might be more than it can handle. 

Just who removes fallen logs and fixes old bridges at some of the smaller parks in Alberta? 

At Brown-Lowery Provincial Park in the foothills north of Turner Valley, a small group of volunteers has been keeping the trails in shape for the past 30 years. 

The 300 Group Trail Maintenance Association officially formed in 2020 as a non-profit society, but group members have been maintaining trails there since the park was established as a provincial recreation area in 1992. 

Back then, Peter Spear and his wife Barbara visited the park and found fallen logs across many of its trails. 

The group’s website says that “within a week, they signed up as volunteers, and equipped with a Swede saw, axe and Pulaski, they started the trail clearance program.” 

Peter Spear, octogenarian and founding member of the 300 Group, said that over the years, spring snowstorms or chinook winds have fallen hundreds of trees at a time in the park. 

In December 2021, a strong chinook wind blew in and caused major damage, Spear said, adding they had never seen such big trees come down. 

“Although we took out over 300 trees across the trail, we’re estimating that we lost over 1,000 trees, because the 300 are just the ones that touched the trail, not the ones that are lying in the forest,” he said. 

Besides trail clearing, the group clears fence line, maintains posts and signs and builds bridges, among other things. 

Spear said there were changes beginning about two years ago, especially with the group's relationship with the provincial government.

To keep working in the park, the group needed to be formalized, and they signed an agreement with Alberta Environment and Parks (AEP). 

AEP wanted to know what the group would be called, Spear said, and they came up with the name of the 300 Group Trail Maintenance Association.  

“This was a sort of a joke, because prior to 2020, if four of us were working at the park, our combined ages were over 300 years, like the average age was 75,” Spear said. 

The group is also required to have WCB coverage for its volunteers and $5 million in liability insurance. 

Over time, friends and acquaintances became involved and the group now numbers about 14 people in all.  

All but one of the volunteers live in Calgary. 

John Dundas, from Okotoks, joined after he came across some of the group members working in the park about a year and a half ago. 

Dundas said they were measuring in preparation to build foot bridges and from that meeting he became the group’s “head construction guy for building walkways.” 

Calling himself a farm kid with “home grown outdoorsman experience,” Dundas wanted to help. 

The group is an interesting mix of people, with many in their early-to-mid-80's, he said. 

“The involvement by volunteers is pretty critical,” Dundas said. 

Dundas once spent a day clearing trees with some other group members and said it’s pretty intense work. 

“You’d see a guy who’s in his 80’s, and that’s not deterring him at all,” he said. 

Dundas, in his mid-40's, runs an oilfield service company and helps at the park whenever his schedule allows.  

“I thought it was a good opportunity to get out into the wild,” he said, “and to be involved with like-minded people in the woods,” adding that helping out with the group has been a very positive experience. 

“The people (in the 300 Group) are very dedicated and committed to that little park,” he said. 

“It’s inspiring to see that that still exists and I’m happy to be part of it.” 

The group plans to complete four more walkways over wet areas of the park this year. All the work depends on public donations, and there is a donor box in the park’s parking lot, off Plummer’s Road, and a GoFundMe account that the group has set up. 


Robert Korotyszyn

About the Author: Robert Korotyszyn

Robert Korotyszyn covers Okotoks and Foothills County news for WesternWheel.ca and the Western Wheel newspaper. For story tips contact [email protected]
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