2025 Accomplishments

It was a challenging year for trails and public lands, but at Washington Trails Association, we saw again and again how willing hikers and other people who love the outdoors are to step up and care for the places they love. 

By showing up when we asked, our community has helped us accomplish so much for trails this year.

Just a few of the year's wins: 

• Early this year, skilled sawyers, both WTA employees and volunteers, helped re-open popular trails at Tiger Mountain. After a bomb cyclone, some of the trails had been invisible under the tangle of fallen trees. When the state legislature faced an extremely challenging budget year, hikers showed up in Olympia. Those efforts helped preserve vital funding for state land managers. 
• In June, members in Congress proposed selling off national public lands in 11 western states, including in Washington. In response, nearly 10,000 people signed WTA’s petition to oppose the sale. Those voices, combined with others acros the nation, were powerful enough to save millions of acres of public lands. 
• And when the U.S. Department of the Interior began a process to open a quarter of our national forests to activities like road-building, logging and mining, more than 3,900 people commented through WTA. They told the federal government to save the Roadless Area Conservation Rule and the 45 million acres of national forest and 25,000 miles of trail that it protects. (That effort is not over yet, and we’ll ask for your help again early in 2026.)

Here’s some of what we accomplished together in 2025:

• Roughly 5 million people relied on WTA’s online resources
• 150,000 hours of trail maintenance
• Over 24,000 members supported WTA’s work with a donation
• 18,374 advocates took action for public lands
• 2,748 volunteers joined us on trail. This people power equals about $4.8 million in donated labor
• 274 trails improved, supporting 75 land managers supported 
• 6,289 outdoor experiences, including more than 4,000 youth, supported through our Outdoor Leadership Training program and gear libraries. 
• WTA ambassadors spent 24 days at trailheads, helping hikers have a safe, responsible and fun time on trail
• 5,600 people — Number of people ambassadors talked to at trailheads. (Up from 1,370 in 2023 and 2,320 in 2024.)