An old trail gets a hand-hewn makeover

Among the many impressive ongoing trail projects in the Northeast, a new stretch of the Appalachian Trail in New York stands out. Half a million people a year visit the peak of Bear Mountain in the Hudson Valley, just an hour outside of Manhattan. An estimated 200,000 hikers annually explore the 18 miles of AT that stretch through Bear Mountain and Harriman state parks-the first section of the AT completed, in 1923.