Martin Readies 1 Last Bridge To Nature

Before he moves on from his city job next week, Martin Torresquintero is hustling to finish one last bridge to connect New Haveners to an overlooked nature wonderland.

Torresquintero (pictured above) has been building those physical and metaphorical bridges for 24 years as the parks department’s outdoor adventures coordinator and park ranger supervisor.

The beloved public servant has teamed up with volunteers throughout town to create and clear trails, construct walkways, and guide generations of young people through interactions with woods and waterways in 1,044 acres in 26 parks. He has created programs for people with disabilities to paddle on the river, taken seniors on tricycle and e‑bike rides, taught lifeguards to use rescue paddle boards, brought kids to hike and climb rocks and navigate ropes courses, distributed donated bikes to hundreds of children and taught them how to ride, carved trails for mountain bikers to wend their way through challenging terrain, invited neighbors to gaze upon migratory birds they never noticed or understood before, and organized kayak fishing and ice-climbing and snowshoeing expeditions.

Nov. 4 is Torresquintero’s last day working for the parks department, where a steady stream of employees have been resigning or retiring recently.

Next month the Colombian-born Torresquintero begins a new job supervising 11 parks for the state Department of Energy and Environmental Protection.

“It’s time for a new chapter in my life,” said Torresquintero, who is 57. ​“I’m very proud of what we have done in this department creating outdoor adventure opportunities and nature education.”

His mind for now is on completing that 40-foot pedestrian bridge. He has enlisted volunteers to help him construct it in a corner of parkland many New Haveners rarely visit in the West Rock Nature Center near West Rock State Park.

This one effort reflects the way countless other Torresquintero-initiated projects have reclaimed public space for residents of a city where parks make up 22 percent of the land — but where the parkland sometimes needs a visionary shepherd with a city’s worth of contacts to figure out how to help people discover and enjoy it.

The Sound Of Rushing Water

The bridge is taking shape along a trail sloping down from the Nature Center parking lot at the Hamden-New Haven line. The Wintergreen Brook (fed by Lake Wintergreen) flows along the path. You can see cars zooming along the Wilbur Cross Parkway in the distance through the trees. But you can’t hear them; the burbling of a small waterfall drowns them out and, amid the fall foliage, delivers a visitor into the realm of natural paradise.

“I love waterfalls. I love the sound of rushing water,” Torresquintero reflected. ​“Many people don’t know about this beautiful gem. This is actually New Haven.”

When an old tree fell by the brook a couple of years ago, Torresquintero saw an opportunity: to create a platform for a new trail so people could enter another part of the woods.

First he worked with volunteers to level the area with wood chips. They put in a retaining wall. It is now an tranquil spot to read a book, say, or do yoga amid the trees.

“This is one of the most idyllic places in the West Rock Nature Center,” Torrresquintero reflected. ​“Right where we’re standing is going to be a picnic table. This will be very close to the road. Very accessible. People can do some walking, some bird-watching.”

Next Torresquintero drew up a design for the 40-foot bridge to connect hikers to an unused portion of the woods. The city’s engineering department refined his design; they didn’t need to pay for an outside architect.

Nor did the city have to pay for the materials. Torresquintero rescued railroad ties and 12-by-12 wooden beams from East Shore Park. The city originally planned to use them to create parking barriers. ​“They were going to get rid of them. I said, ​‘Let me reuse them!’ ” He obtained other materials for the bridge with money and donations raised during bike events.

Usually a crane would be brought in to transfer all that material to the wooded spot, Torresquintero said. He was able to save that expense — and prevent the attendant damage to trees — by making use of rigging to set up a pulley system. He enlisted park rangers and volunteers from the growing biotech company Arvinas on a community-service day to help him carry the several-hundred-pound beams and other materials to the spot and assemble the frame. They hauled in stones to stabilize the bridge.

Now park rangers are helping cut boards for the decking and hand railings.

“My goal is have this bridge completed or near completion right before I leave,” Torresquintero said. ​“The idea of this bridge is to connect this trail with a trail that we’re restoring so you can completely circumnavigate the West Rock Nature Center and hike onto the property that is on the other side of the brook.”

Torresquintero and his enlistees have been working for the past few years to connect those two sides of the brook with an evolving new Orange Trail.

On one side of the brook is the 45-acre nature center. On the other sit about 50-some acres of unused wooded land owned by the city. The removal of a notorious fence dividing Hamden from New Haven (a fragment of which is pictured above) made the prospect of reconnection possible. The rebuilding of public-housing developments in the West Rock neighborhood presented an opportunity to bring nature to families’ back door.

Last year Solar Youth ​“trail blazers” helped Torresquintero put in these steps made of reclaimed railroad ties, along with a ramp for mountain bikers …

… leading down to a newly constructed footbridge linking the two previously separated properties on either side of the brook.

“This is very healing, a simple walk in the forest,” Torresquintero reflected as he ascended another set of newly constructed stairs. To his left he pointed to the remnants of a cistern used centuries ago when the property was a private onion farm. As usual, plans eddied in Torresquintero’s imagination: We should cap the cistern, to prevent people from falling in, he said — then turn it into a wishing well where people can draw up their hopes and dreams.

Making Nature Fun

The stairs led to a portion of the unused non-Nature Center city-owned side of the brook. Actually it had been used — by illegal dumpers. Veteran park steward Peter Davis and his volunteer companion David Burgess spent a month removing the appliances and car parts and other junk that dominated the space. Now it’s a picturesque spot where hikers can enter the evolving Orange Trail from Wayfarer Street.

Neighborhood kids have grown more familiar with the woods. They’ve also learned about the plants and animals there from Torresquintero.

“He got the woods cleared. He made nature fun. Our kids now walk the trails. We see the deer, the bears, the bobcats. It’s beautiful. He taught them what a birch tree was, what evergreen trees were, what a shoot was. They learned about the different type of grass, weeds, what was allergic, what was not,” said West Hills/West Rock Alder Honda Smith.

“I love that guy. He has been making a difference since I’ve known him. He will be greatly missed.”

Torresquintero has done the same for neighborhoods all across town. Former Clinton Avenue School Principal Carmen Ana Rodriguez spoke of the difference Torresquintero made in her students’ lives. He brought a climbing wall to her school, recruited families to sign up their kids for his canoeing program, took kids safely into nature in the summer youth Eco Adventures camp. ​“It opened up their trust in nature,” she recalled.

Torresquintero inspired a generation of nature lovers — and fellow stewards. Joe Milone met Torresquintero when Torresquintero visited his Southern Connecticut State University class. Milone interned with him, then became a park ranger, under his guidance, before landing a spot back at Southern as a professor of recreation management. ​“He is one of the most energetic and supportive people you will ever meet,” Milone said. ​“He has a passion for the outdoors and nature.”

No Bridge Too Far

“All of this is new,” Torresquintero said back on the Orange Trail as he approached yet another pedestrian crossing constructed over the creek in the summer with the help of Youth@Work-ers near the under-reconstruction Westville Manor development.

Winding his way back to the start of the hike, Torresquintero spoke of the next work needing to be done along the trail once the new 40-foot bridge is completed — after he moves on to his new state job.

He has drawn up plans for the department’s remaining park rangers to construct a boardwalk by the brook on the other side and a ladder to help hikers descend there.

“I don’t mind,” he added, ​“coming on weekends to help.”

Click on the video to watch a conversation with Martin Torresquinetero about the under-construction Nature Center bridge on the​“Word on the Street” segment of WNHH’s​“LoveBabz LoveTalk” program, including discussion of road rage and crashes on Edgewood and the impact of new bike lanes. Click here to subscribe to WNHH FM’s​“LoveBabz LoveTalk” and here to subscribe to other WNHH programs.