North Allegheny Intermediate High School students who are used to uneven and muddy biking and jogging trails behind the school are in for a surprise when gym classes ramp up to full speed next week.

A local contractor and McCandless have donated a combined $50,000 in materials and labor to grade the trails and pave them with crushed asphalt. "It's nicer and cleaner," said Dave Schmidt, North Allegheny's health and physical education chairman and advanced fitness teacher at the school. "I am very happy."

Mr. Schmidt had wanted to improve the mile of trails for years. The packed dirt was uneven, and when it rained, it was muddy.

Last fall, he began formulating a plan to create formal trails. McCandless donated $6,500 worth of crushed asphalt it had on hand from milling roads.

Not long after that Rich Doyle, construction manager at the multimillion-dollar McCandless Crossing development, heard about the project and arranged to have his employer, Trumbull Corp. of Pittsburgh, donate equipment and labor.

"Trumbull likes to do a lot of community work when we can," said Mr. Doyle, who lives in McCandless. "We try to be good neighbors."

Last month, Mr. Doyle and a Trumbull crew spent a little more than a week creating the 7-foot-wide by 4-inch-deep trail that snakes around the school's ball fields, into bordering woods and back again.

With a few front-end loaders and dump trucks, they dug out the old trail, leveled the ground, put down a geo-tech fabric to keep away weeds and filled in the gravel.

All told, Trumbull's donations totaled about $44,000, said the district's facilities director Rob Gaertner.

Eventually, Mr. Gaertner said, the gravel will compact and become similar to the Montour Trail, a popular biking trail that starts in Coraopolis and ends in Clinton.

Mr. Schmidt said nearly 1,300 students are expected to use the trail for walking, mountain biking, running and jogging.

The community is invited to use the trails after school hours, too, he said.

Now that the trail is complete, he would like to get a grant to build exercise stations along its path and put up distance markers.

"We'll get that done, one way or another," Mr. Schmidt said.

While the students and community will enjoy the improvements, there is another group who will undoubtedly be thankful for the gravel trails.

"The custodial staff [who had to keep hallways mud-free] will be happy," Mr. Schmidt said, smiling.

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