HANOVER — Dartmouth College last week announced a $5 million plan to improve the trail system and facilities at Oak Hill-Storrs Pond Recreation Area, where the college plans to host the NCAA Skiing Championships in 2025.

Project objectives include the construction of five overlapping course loops that meet the racing standards set by the International Ski and Snowboard Federation, skiing’s highest governing body, as well as lighting for the trails, snowmaking equipment, and a new garage for the center’s PistenBully, a snow grooming vehicle.

Oak Hill is part of the Dartmouth Cross Country Ski Center, a 500-acre, multi-parcel property owned by the college and is home to Dartmouth’s men’s and women’s cross country ski teams. It neighbors the Hanover Improvement Society-owned Storrs Pond Recreation Area, which several Oak Hill ski trails cross into, and consists of about 12.5 miles of trails.

The news release noted that work on the project is expected to start in early 2023 “with the goal of constructing trails and snowmaking in time for the 2023-24 ski season.”

The project is expected to cost $5 million, with half of that funded by the college and the other half funded by private donors. A nonprofit, “the Friends of Oak Hill,” whose members Dartmouth Athletic Director Mike Harrity said haven’t been finalized yet, is charged with assisting in designing, constructing and managing the new facilities.

Dartmouth Women’s Nordic Head Coach Cami Thompson Graves said she’s been working on this project “for years” and that the improvements to the trail system, specifically the ability to make snow on about 3 kilometers of the new trails, will make a “huge difference” for her team.

“In NCAA skiing — alpine, Nordic, men’s, women’s — all count towards the final score,” Thompson Graves said. “So, (this project) means a lot to us because if our athletes can be healthier, know our course well, rely on the snow here and train here regularly, we’re going to be more successful.”

The new courses will feature 5 km, 3.75 km, 3.3 km, and 1.4 km overlapping loops and will have snowmaking and lighting on 3 km of those new trails, according to the project’s master plan. Thompson Graves said the trails at Oak Hill have only received the “bare minimum” of maintenance since the last time Dartmouth hosted the NCAA Skiing Championships, which was in 2003.

The trails have “narrowed” since then, as trees and brambles have become overgrown, which has limited the types of races the Nordic team can host at the site, Thompson Graves said. The new loops will allow the Nordic team to host sprint and master races at Oak Hill, she said.

Inconsistent snowfall has been an issue in the past in the area, particularly during the college’s annual Winter Carnival held every February, which sees the Nordic and alpine teams compete against local colleges in races.

For four years, from 2014 to 2017, the Nordic races had to be moved 1½ hours north of Hanover to Craftsbury, Vt., because of insufficient snow at Oak Hill.

“Probably half the time we’ve hosted (Winter Carnival) recently, we’ve gone to Craftsbury,” Thompson Graves said. “The other half of the time we’ve been (at Oak Hill) shoveling trying to make it happen.”

Oak Hill’s trails aren’t exclusively used by Dartmouth-affiliated skiers, though. The site is popular among recreational skiers and snowboarders, snowshoers, and ice skaters and, the news release from Dartmouth noted, Hanover High School, the Ford Sayre Ski Program and regional club ski teams use the area’s trails as well.

The Upper Valley is deep in the heart of winter snow country, Thompson Graves said, and she thinks the facility improvements coming to Oak Hill will help teach members of the Dartmouth community unfamiliar with snow how to have fun with it.

Storrs Pond is also only a short walk from Bernice A. Ray Elementary School, and Thompson Graves said eventually they will extend the lights to that area. She sees the project as a way to grow community engagement with the Oak Hill area.

“There are days we’re out there and we see hundreds of kids,” Thompson Graves said. “I see that growing even more, not just with kids but with people who show up after work to train there.”

Ray Couture can be reached at 1994rbc@gmail.com.

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