Okanagan Rail Trail fundraising begins with website launch

FUNDRAISING DRIVE AIMS FOR NEARLY $8 MILLION

OKANAGAN VALLEY – A grassroots campaign to raise $7.9 million for construction of the Okanagan Rail Trail begins tomorrow with the launch of a new website.

Beginning tomorrow, May 18, okanaganrailtrail.ca will take would-be donors through the technical specifications of the first phase, a basic 4.6-metre wide compacted crushed aggregate trail stretching 48.5 kilometres from Coldstream to the existing rail trail in Kelowna.

Construction costs are estimated at $164 per metre and, depending on the success of the fundraising campaign, will begin in 2017.

The website notes how the trail passes by Kelowna International Airport, UBC Okanagan, the Vernon campus of Okanagan College and more than 40 recreational and cultural points of interest.

Donations are handled by the Community Foundation of the North Okanagan and the Central Okanagan Foundation.

Find more stories on the Okanagan Rail Trail here.


To contact a reporter for this story, email John McDonald or call 250-808-0143 or email the editor. You can also submit photos, videos or news tips to the newsroom and be entered to win a monthly prize draw.

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John McDonald

John began life as a journalist through the Other Press, the independent student newspaper for Douglas College in New Westminster. The fluid nature of student journalism meant he was soon running the place, learning on the fly how to publish a newspaper.

It wasn’t until he moved to Kelowna he broke into the mainstream media, working for Okanagan Sunday, then the Kelowna Daily Courier and Okanagan Saturday doing news graphics and page layout. He carried on with the Kelowna Capital News, covering health and education while also working on special projects, including the design and launch of a mass market daily newspaper. After 12 years there, John rejoined the Kelowna Daily Courier as editor of the Westside Weekly, directing news coverage as the Westside became West Kelowna.

But digital media beckoned and John joined Kelowna.com as assistant editor and reporter, riding the start-up as it at first soared then went down in flames. Now John is turning dirt as city hall reporter for iNFOnews.ca where he brings his long experience to bear on the civic issues of the day.

If you have a story you think people should know about, email John at jmcdonald@infonews.ca

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