Our History
Since 1997, the Truckee River Legacy Foundation has led the effort to protect, restore and provide access to the Truckee River for future generations. The founders understood the River deserves to be the heart of Truckee.
The Challenge
Truckee developed around the stagecoach, railroad, and later the automobile. We turned our backs on a scenic river – using it as a sewer as well as a source of water and ice. Much of the riverfront within Truckee remains blighted by 150 years of industrial use where native riparian vegetation has been displaced by dirt fill, concrete, rebar, and other garbage.
“It took us 100 years to screw up the river, it may take us 100 years to fix it.”
— Frank Bulkley, Founding TRLF Member
The Opportunity
In 1997 Truckee Rotary members created Our Truckee River Legacy Foundation to fulfill a vision to protect, restore and provide access to the Truckee River for future generations. The founders understood the River deserves to be the heart of Truckee. They took the long view: “It took us 100 years to screw up the river, it may take us 100 years to fix it.”
The Legacy Trail, envisioned to connect all Truckee neighborhoods with the Truckee River, was identified as the first tangible project - an audacious goal. The Foundation and Truckee Rotary were essential catalysts to get this project started.
Our Start
Significant planning, community donations, and volunteers (with picks, shovels and donated machinery) mobilized to build the first phase - a dirt trail from the Regional Park to the East River Street Bridge. The Town of Truckee along with partner organizations built on this initiative to create the popular paved trail from the Regional Park to Glenshire. Plans are in motion to build the entire length of the Legacy Trail to Donner Lake and further extensions of the trail are now being led by the Town of Truckee.
With leadership from many Rotarians, the Foundation has been phenomenally successful at raising funds from our extended community for our Truckee River vision. Between 2010 and 2020, the Foundation awarded grants to community partners: Truckee River Watershed Council received two substantial grants to restore McIver Dairy Meadow (which flows directly into the Truckee River) and the Donner Creek confluence with the Truckee River; Truckee Trails Foundation received funding to design a dirt trail connecting the Ponderosa Palisades neighborhood to the Legacy Trail and the Truckee River.
In 2020, the Foundation made the largest grant in its history ($150,000) to the Truckee Donner Land Trust to help fund the acquisition of Truckee Springs. This purchase preserved the previously private and inaccessible 26-acre parcel in downtown as natural open space with trails and river access for public enjoyment forever. Truckee Springs is a key to connecting the Legacy Trail, as envisioned, from Glenshire to Lake Tahoe and Donner Lake and providing continuous access to the “wild-side” of Truckee.
Our Future
While the Town, Truckee Trails and recently the Land Trust have stepped up, the connectivity to the river envisioned by our founders is far from complete. There’s a role for our Foundation, the only local organization focused on the main stem of the Truckee river, to help drive this project and many others forward. And the Legacy Trail was just one project envisioned by the founders. As Frank Bulkley said “We’ve got to remember this is a 100-year project.” Sierra Sun (cirqa 1997)
In 2020 the Board unanimously agreed to recruit new Foundation board members from the community to continue serving the original mission. Our first step will be to create a clear and compelling vision of the future of the Truckee River within our town. Then we bring people, organizations and resources together to make it happen.
What We’ve Achieved
Truckee River Legacy Trail
Vivamus egestas urna sed lorem sagittis, id lacinia erat porta cras.
Morbi eu elit in justo auctor dignissim. Sed ultrices eget neque tellus.
Sed fermentum eget velit at eleifend. Donec volutpat est a felis pulvinar.
Donec condimentum enim sit amet felis dignissim laoreet adipiscing dignissim.
Vivamus egestas urna sed lorem sagittis, id lacinia erat porta cras.
Morbi eu elit in justo auctor dignissim. Sed ultrices eget neque tellus.
Sed fermentum eget velit at eleifend. Donec volutpat est a felis pulvinar.