Warren County maps vision for expanded tourism

New plan aims to maximize economic potential of recreation assets; could be model for entire Adirondack region

By Mike Lynch

Warren County—with Lake George, scenic trails, the Hudson River and many mountain bike trails—has some of Adirondack Park’s best outdoor assets. 

Now, county officials are taking a deeper look at those assets, hoping to bring additional dollars to communities and attract not only visitors but year-round residents. 

“We enjoy outdoor recreation, but we want to better understand the economic impacts of it, and then further leverage those economic impacts for community benefit,” said Warren County Planner Ethan Gaddy. “It plays such an important role in Warren County, but we don’t really have a good understanding of it.”

The county has hired SE Group and Common Ground Consulting to help create its Outdoor Recreation Economy Strategic Plan, a document that may serve as a blueprint for other regions. 

The team has put together an inventory of recreation and business assets, held stakeholder meetings, conducted surveys and gathered reports and plans already completed by communities. 

They received feedback from nonprofits that work throughout the Adirondack Park, including the Adirondack Mountain Club, Adirondack Land Trust and Adirondack Council, hearing about state and other partners not investing enough in trail maintenance. 

This is becoming a chance for Warren County to take the lead by promoting “community engagement and resource protection” in relation to trail projects, according to the report. 

In April, Warren County produced a research report that will be used to develop the strategic plan. The final draft will contain cost estimates and project recommendations. 

The plan—due by the end of the year—will be used as they attempt to leverage funds, including grants, for those projects. 

Outdoor recreation economy plans are much rarer than resource conservation plans in the Adirondacks. The last parkwide plan to address the economy, in 2014, produced the Adirondack Park Recreation Strategy spearheaded by the state Department of Environmental Conservation and the Regional Office of Sustainable Tourism (ROOST), which is based in Lake Placid. ROOST develops destination marketing plans, among other things.

Former ROOST CEO Jim McKenna, the co-chair of the North Country Regional Economic Council, applauded what Warren County’s doing but said it’s time for a new parkwide strategy. 

“Parkwide plans, to me, are the best,” he said. “Certainly, Warren County doing it, that’s a good thing. A lot of things that are in Warren County, once you get within the Blue Line borders, are similar to the rest of the park. I’m sure there’ll be good things that they come up with that can certainly assist other areas of the park.”

Gaddy said Warren County hopes to collaborate with other park entities for future efforts.

“I could see this as being a model for other communities to follow,” he said. “We participate in Common Ground Alliance and all these other regional groups, and we talk to people at the Northern Forest Center. Ideally, our county, we hope to be a leader in this.” 

Warren County, despite its success as a tourism destination, faces many of the same challenges as other nearby counties, including lacking modern sewer infrastructure in some communities, needing more accessible recreation options and trying to navigate a world where visitors get their information from a variety of internet and social media sources, including some that are unreliable. It also has some of the same opportunities, including noticing a trend of visitors wanting more biking options. 

Warren County research states that in 2022, tourism generated $859 million in direct traveler spending, the most of any Adirondack county. By comparison, Essex County visitors spent $818 million, Franklin County visitors spent $140 million and Hamilton County visitors spent  $104 million. 

The spending directly supported 5,866 jobs in Warren County, accounting for 16.4% of countywide jobs, according to the report. 

Tourism accounted for 11,000 jobs, the county’s Department of Workforce Development estimated, including related retail positions. That’s a third of the county’s 33,000 workers.

Lodging is key

Warren is one of several counties that straddles the Adirondack Park border. Glens Falls and Queensbury fall just outside the park boundary, while Lake George is at the gateway. Smaller communities, such as Brant Lake, Warrensburg, Chestertown and North Creek, lie within the park. 

The county contains more than 270 miles of hiking trails, three downhill ski areas—including Gore Mountain in North Creek—seven cross-country mountain bike networks, 44 campgrounds and camping areas, and more than 200,000 acres of state land.

It’s also home to 42 lakes and ponds greater than 40 acres in size, with Lake George—a huge tourism driver—the biggest. 

The 62-page report points to the variety and quality of recreational assets—including some near downtowns—as a major benefit. The county is also within driving distance of the population centers of Albany, New York City and New Jersey.

But there are several areas where it could improve, including needing a “consolidated and centralized information source for outdoor recreation,” and more lodging in some communities. 

“Overnight accommodations are of particular importance to the outdoor recreation economy, as overnight visitation typically results in significantly higher visitor spending,” states the report. 

One of the issues is that most hotels are clustered in southern Warren County, and places like North Creek have few options.

Another issue is that hotel occupancy goes through dramatic swings—80% in August, 30% in January. That causes businesses to close in late fall. 

Complicating the development of hotels, North Creek and Johnsburg lack a sewer system. People do stay overnight but at short-term rentals, which takes housing away from people looking for residences.

Community benefits

SE Group Recreation Planner Alex Belensz says that outdoor recreation is an important part of a community’s identity and can touch “almost every area of that local economy” and help sustain local stores and shops.

People, including remote workers, move to these small towns to enjoy the outdoors and be part of the Adirondack lifestyle. The report states that residents indicated that “outdoor recreation is of similar importance to other key quality of life factors, such as cost of living, schools, wages, and housing—a key factor for resident and workforce attraction and retention.” 

“If Warren County continues to provide high-quality, outdoor recreation experiences, I think we’ll have a competitive advantage over other areas that don’t provide this,” Gaddy said.

Trail builder Steve Ovitt, a retired forest ranger, promotes tying trail systems together and having them connect to residential areas and community centers. He calls for easy, accessible trails in towns leading to backcountry paths. This would cater to kids and people of different abilities.  

Such systems help foster a sense of community ownership and inspire stewardship plus an alternative to a wilderness outing after which a visitor never visits the host community. 

“You wonder why Adirondack communities die when we’re sitting in the middle of an incredible recreational destination. That’s why,” Orvitt said. “We’re just catering to a small group.”

Some communities have already started developing connected systems that offer varying levels of difficulty and tie their backcountry assets into downtowns and residential areas through trails or signage.

Near Lake George, Bolton completed a hub recreation plan in 2019. The plan, which Gaddy worked on as a consultant, focuses on combining environmental stewardship, businesses and connecting trail networks. 

The plan mentions connecting The Pinnacle, a popular hike, to downtown, which is two miles away, through a trail and signage but that hasn’t happened yet. North Creek, which created a recreation trail plan in 2019 that Ovitt helped develop, has a multi-layered trail system that ties into the business district through the town-run Ski Bowl, which is roughly a quarter mile from downtown and offers mountain biking, hiking and skiing. 

“That’s the whole point to get (people) to come downtown and spend money,” said Johnsburg Supervisor Kevin Bean.

Nathan Etu, a Warren County supervisor who lives in Queensbury, said his town has developed a robust system of in-town trails that he visits with his young family. “It’s a great increase to our quality of life,” Etu said. 

The popularity of biking there has led a local business, Rick’s Bike Shop, to set up an outpost near the entrance that offers rentals and other services. 

In the Northern Adirondacks, the state partnered with towns and nonprofits to create the 34-mile Adirondack Rail Trail to connect Lake Placid, Saranac Lake and Tupper Lake, and potentially bring more visitors and business to the communities.

Other places, like Elizabethtown, Brant Lake, Caroga Lake and Wilmington, have been positioning themselves in recent years to draw more mountain bike tourists by developing trails and promoting related businesses. 

The concept of tying recreation to businesses has been done successfully in many places in Vermont, particularly with mountain biking, a growing segment of the outdoor recreation economy in the Adirondacks.

Belensz pointed to Vermont’s East Burke in the Northeast Kingdom as a place where mountain bikers park their motor vehicles near businesses before using the trails. 

“It’s very convenient at the end of your day to patronize a local business,” he said.

Centralized information

The report also states “there is still room for improving the accessibility and comfort of outdoor recreation amenities to residents and visitors of varying ability levels.”

Traditionally, Lake George is packed in the summer months with visitors using the boardwalk, beach, steamboats and village. The visitors are candidates for outdoor attractions in other parts of the county.

“What’s the next step to find activities … that will take some of these earlier stage users and get them to safely and comfortably and sustainably enjoy outdoor recreation?” Gaddy said. 

Getting accurate and appropriate information to such people is important. Warren County has developed an interactive website and an app that contains its recreation assets. But Belensz said Warren County could step those a step further and consider more holistic approaches to help visitors find recreation itineraries, accommodations and local businesses.  

“There’s a lot of different information sources out there,” Belensz said. “There would be a lot of benefit to the different tourism partners in the county partnering together and identifying ways where they could jointly share information and (have) a more comprehensive platform.”

The top photo by Mike Lynch shows a motorboat traveling on Lake George near Bolton Landing.