By Jennifer Champagne
Managing Editor
A contentious chapter in Alger County’s snowmobiling history has reached a turning point. After more than a decade of stalled negotiations, expired agreements and frustrated stakeholders, Trail 422 has officially reopened under a five-year permit allowing snowmobiles to share a 0.8-mile section of H-58 near Miners Castle.
The move marks a compromise between the Alger County Road Commission, the Snowmobile and ORV Association of Alger County and the Michigan Department of Natural Resources — and comes just in time for trail maintenance and grant deadlines ahead of winter.
The issue came to a head in 2024, when the Road Commission declined to renew the long-standing snowmobile access permit, citing liability concerns and potential damage to the newly paved highway.
Public backlash was swift. Tourism leaders, snowmobilers and even U.S. Rep. Jack Bergman weighed in, urging the commission to reconsider. Still, the board remained deadlocked — until now.
At a meeting Monday, Vice Chair Scott LaCombe made a motion to reopen the trail under a permit structure. State Rep. Karl Bohnak (R-Deerton) was in attendance, offering visible support for a local resolution to the long-running issue.
“I made a motion for the Road Commission to give a yearly permit. And then at the end of five years, they can assess what, if any, damage has been done by snowmobiling on that section of road,” LaCombe said. “Five years is not a deadline. If there’s been significant damage by snowmobiles at the end of five years, the Road Commission can revoke the permit.”
The motion passed with board support, and Road Commission Manager Robert Lindbeck stood behind the decision.
“I think it’s a good cooperative effort by all parties to work together for the community,” Lindbeck said. “I still remain concerned with the safety of having a snowmobile trail on the pavement, with guardrailing on both sides of a paved roadway. I’m concerned with that mixed traffic, but I think that this was a good compromise, a good cooperative effort to work together with the Snowmobile Association, the DNR and the Road Commission.”
LaCombe, who also sits on the state’s Snowmobile Advisory Workgroup, said his dual role gave him a unique view of the issue — including his personal history with the trail.
“I groomed that trail back in the ’90s, you know, when I worked for Gerou’s,” he said. “There’s never been an accident. The probability of an accident or the possibility — that’s not how you get rid of snowmobile trails.”
Cori-Ann Cearley, president of the Munising Visitors Bureau and a newly appointed Road Commission board member, had made it a personal priority to get the trail reopened.
“One of my big objectives when joining the Road Commission was to see that trail reopen,” she said. “It was very important to me as a member of the community, as a member of the tourism community, to see some form of access reopened and to reexplore it.”
Cearley noted that the previous board’s intent was never to shut down snowmobiling, but rather to find a safer, permanent alternative route — something that proved impossible because of restrictions on adjacent land owned by Manulife.
“Originally when the board closed the trail, it was trying to get the trail moved. That was the game plan,” she said. “It was more of the fact that they wanted the trail off the road, which they still want the trail off the road.”
That goal collided with the reality of a 2008 conservation easement, which prohibits new structures — including bridges — across Manulife’s timberland.
“The conservation easement states that there can be no structures put on this land. Ever,” Cearley said. “So currently right now there is no other option.”
Cearley also expressed concern about the $1,000 annual permit fee included in the agreement.
“I did state during the meeting and I stand by this as well that I don’t think we should arbitrarily be charging these to one type of road user and not others,” she said. “I don’t know how that is legal or best practice, regardless of if we can do it, I don’t think we should be doing it.”
The fee — introduced in LaCombe’s motion — will be paid not by the DNR’s snowmobile program, but by the local snowmobile club.
“The local snowmobile club [SORVA] has stepped up and is going to pay this. The snowmobile program via the DNR is not going to be paying this,” said Sean O’Neill, president of the Snowmobile and ORV Association of Alger County. “We don’t want to set the precedent across the state where all the road commissions are going to start charging all the snowmobile clubs and just kill us.”
O’Neill said the club has already begun trail preparations, with support from local donors and the Visitors Bureau.
“We’re lucky. We have the Visitors Bureau — they support us,” he said. “And between that and our general membership, it’s about another $10,000.”
Despite lingering legal questions about whether the fee constitutes a license or violates snowmobile access laws, O’Neill said the group is moving forward.
“It’s sweet,” he said. “We will have a groomed trail going up to Miners Castle, where people can go up and enjoy the view over the National Park.”
LaCombe called the decision a long-overdue course correction.
“I read everything. I read the state law,” he said. “But I didn’t see anything where there couldn’t be a trail there.”
Lindbeck, who has been involved in trail discussions for more than a decade, agreed.
“We’ve been talking about this for 13 years,” he said. “How can we separate the snowmobile trail from the county’s primary road?”
After years of impasse, all parties seem to agree: This permit is a workable — if imperfect — solution.
As Cearley put it: “Right now this is the only option, so we are taking the only option.”
The next Road Commission meeting is scheduled for Aug. 18 at 4 p.m. at the commission office in Munising.