FRIENDS of the Blue Ridge Parkway

Our children are at risk! Children’s lives have moved indoors. Screen spaces have replaced green places. Children between the ages of 6-16 spend 8.5 hours per day with electronic media.

FRIENDS of the Blue Ridge Parkway is engaging the next generation in thousands of hours of volunteer service on the Blue Ridge Parkway.

FRIENDS is facilitating community tree plantings to buffer the Blue Ridge Parkway from development, inspiring hundreds of children and multi-cultural youth in preservation and education.

FRIENDS is providing “Alternative Spring Breaks” for Warren Wilson College, Shawnee State University and Notre Dame University students to repair trails, split-rail fences and clean campgrounds, investing hundreds of hours of volunteer service.

They are also engaging strong and courageous high school students who worked through rain, sleet, hail and snow to repair the Abbott Lake Trail at Peaks of Otter on the way to making the trail compliant to ADA-accessibility standards.

FRIENDS is coordinating hundreds of children in grades 3-12 in the clean-up of 105 campsites and grounds at Roanoke Mountain Campground, refurbishment of the Parkway’s River Gorge Trail, and clean-up of the Roanoke Valley Horse Trail, Chestnut Ridge Trail, generating over 2,500 volunteer hours.

The group also funds Junior Ranger programs, Youth Volunteers In Parks experiences, and other education programs on the Blue Ridge Parkway.

To help keep these programs going in the future, designate your gift to CVC #3535.

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