Donald Teuma-Castelletti
CAMPBELL’S BAY Jan. 16, 2018
A local snowmobiling club received a huge amount of funding from the Ministry of Transport, for both the purpose of maintaining their trails and the purchase of equipment.
It was announced on Jan. 16 that the Pontiac Snowmobile Drivers Association (PSDA) would receive $126,245 in funding this year from the province.
“There’s new snow grooming equipment that we have purchased,” said PSDA president Alain Goulet. “It’s a new farm tractor on tracks with a new drag, which is what grooms the trail.”
While exactly $100,000 was allocated for equipment, as the group bought the new machine for grooming the trails last year, the remainder is to be used for trail maintenance over the year. This marks a 26.9 per cent increase in funds allocated for trail maintenance over last year.
Goulet explained that this tractor will make a world of difference in their efforts as a club that relies on volunteers in order to prepare the trails for local snowmobile drivers.
“The club is supposed to have five groomers for the amount of kilometres that it has … our club has about 360 km so we should have four and a half groomers, but some of the equipment is pretty old, so having a new piece of equipment, and the right amount of equipment will definitely help when grooming all of the trails when we get snow,” said Goulet. “Since we’re all volunteer operators in our club, since we can’t afford to pay people to do it, it makes for shorter runs for the volunteers. It’s a lot easier asking a volunteer to go out for six to nine hours then it is asking a volunteer to go out for 12 to 16 hours at a time.”
It was also announced that the Pingouins Snowmobile Club will receive $93,453 in funding this year, an increase of 12.9 per cent, while the Pontiac Quad Club received $45,185, a decrease of 8.5 per cent.
The funding for the clubs is distributed from the Land Transportation Network Fund out of the off-road vehicle owners’ payments when registering their vehicles. The funding announcements were made by Pontiac MNA and Minister of Transport, Sustainable Mobility and Transport Electrification André Fortin.
