State Sen. Andrew Jones was inspired by a portion of old railroad.

Jones, R-Centre, uses the old Tennessee-Alabama-Georgia railway and how much of it has been destroyed over the years as an example when discussing his reasoning for authoring Senate Bill 298, which was passed unanimously by both chambers of the Alabama Legislature earlier this year.

“There are these historic tunnels that were built by hand, and I remember seeing on Facebook that a property owner had all these folks coming onto his property to check out the tunnels … He was worried about liability, he didn’t like having trespassers, and so he got a bulldozer and filled it in,” Jones said. “It was, to me, such a waste, because that’s the kind of historical, those historical things need to be preserved.”

In addition to furthering Jones’ goal of preserving parts of Alabama’s outdoor history, the legislation created the Sweet Trails Alabama Project Fund and the Sweet Trails Alabama Acquisition Fund, with a primary goal of creating a network of outdoor trails connecting the state. Part of the legislation would provide liability coverage and funding to erect barriers around privately owned property that are next to the trails.

The legislation allows property owners to donate it in exchange for grants equal to 25% of the fair market value of the donated property, up to $250,000.

“One of the benefits of trails is when …you bring more people to an area to see something like that, the more eyes are on it, it helps bring attention to it and it helps to preserve it. So, we have tons of things like that around the state,” Jones added.