The completed parking area at Charlotte C. Browne Woods. *Photo: Debra Marnich*

Thank you to Shane Gurney of Gurney Excavation! *Photo: Debra Marnich*

We are delighted to announce the completion of a new off-road parking area at Charlotte C. Browne Woods on Washington Hill Road. Chocorua Lake Conservancy (CLC) Stewardship Director Debra Marnich secured the necessary permits and reviews, and oversaw the onsite design and management of the construction project. The 45’ x 70’ parking lot was built by Shane Gurney of Gurney Excavation in Madison, NH, with generous funding from The Tamworth Foundation and CLC donors. A big thank you to Shane, who went above and beyond in a season of extreme weather conditions! The parking area was completed early this summer, and is suitable for seven or eight vehicles. Once the parking area was finished, Deb seeded the berm with a pollinator-friendly seed mix that will flower from spring through autumn.

The newly-seeded berm. *Photo: Debra Marnich*

The parking area allows CLC educational program participants to park safely, and has already been the jumping-off location for two programs this summer. The first flowers of the pollinator mix and the strip of low plants and shrubs between the parking area and the edge of the woods made for great fly and insect exploration at our July walk with Linda Graetz—we spent the first 40 minutes of the program in the parking lot!

CLC volunteers who help steward and manage the several properties in that area will also use the parking area, and, as funding allows, we hope to use it to host winter programs as well, where often the main constraint is parking along roads made narrow by snowbanks.

We hope this parking area will also support community well-being and quality of life by improving access to recreational opportunities on beautiful CLC conservation land. Thank you to everyone who made this project possible!