March 25th marked the day Dante “midway upon the journey of his life found himself within a forest dark, for the straightforward pathway had been lost,” thus kicking off “The Divine Comedy.” So it seemed right to meet and sit down on that day with Virgils of the San Marcos Greenbelt Alliance, Todd Derkacz and Cameron Herber, to find out about the new trails in Purgatory Creek: Inferno and Farinata.
Before we even broached names, I learned about the art, the science, and the social alchemy of naming trails. The art comes in choosing names that resonate through all kinds of communication media. Names need to be unique and pronounceable, so if you are a visiting New Englander telling a friend or a first responder where you are located, you don’t have to guess at the pronunciation of Menchaca.
Likewise, the science requires choosing names with first letters that don’t already exist in the park system, so that the trail markers don’t become too cumbersome. Science also dictates that appellations must mesh with the theme. So while Manfred, King of Sicily, is totally on brand, because Malacoda already exists at Purgatory Creek, Manfred doesn’t make the cut.
Finally, the social alchemy comes from balancing popular practice with stakeholder preferences. As it turns out, this balancing act also applies to the trail blazing and maintenance of official and rogue trails. Todd explained rogue trails, aka social trails or desire paths, come about when the general public blazes its own way independent of official entities like SMGA or SM Parks and Rec. Rogue trails offer great insights into our community values, from shorter connections to less-technical terrain, even though they may frustrate stakeholders’ designs and preferences (trail maintainers worldwide have unpublishable names for rogue trails).
Cameron told me both Inferno and Farinata started life as rogue trails and that SMGA learned how to adapt them to the larger plan, as well as adjusting their own plans to provide more acces- sible foot travel for a user group that was growing rapidly in numbers, abilities, and distances traveled. Purgatory Creek is now a destination trail system, and the names of these new trails reflect that reality.
Inferno is unique and pronounceable, starts with I, which isn’t represented in the trail system, and captures the Dante theme wonderfully for an exposed footpath. Inferno is also a clever adaptation of the crowdsourced name “Ring of Fire,” found on both Strava and Trail Forks.
Farinata checked the art and science boxes as well, but took a little more alchemy. Cameron revealed that volunteers and city employees lobbied hard for a number of different names, but eventually Farinata rose to the top, given his unique role in the Divine Comedy.
Farinata was the Florentine politician who resided in the sixth circle of hell reserved for heretics. Dante respected Farinata even though he disagreed with him vehemently, thus casting him as a kind of noble damned character in the Inferno. It’s exactly the kind of name trail maintainers would give to an adapted rogue trail.
Given all the hard work that’s gone into converting these trials and the clever alchemy in naming them, it would be a shame if we didn’t use them. So San Martians, get out there and enjoy these destination trails in our own backyard.
