Upper Cumberland Motorcycle Group Working on Litter Cleanups.

The Upper Cumberland Trail Riders Motorcycle Club has begun working on monthly litter cleanups.

President Nick Hensley said the group wanted to begin doing litter cleanups to preserve the natural beauty of the landscape in the Upper Cumberland. He said by doing these cleanups, they can also shine a positive light on the reputation of motorcyclists.

“Everybody that’s a part of our club are highly educated professional people that care about the land,” Hensley said. “And we just want to make sure that our past time is being portrayed in a positive light, and I figure this is one good way we could do that.”

Hensley said the group targeted Cravenstown Road in Overton County because of the debris there. He said before they began cleaning there was about 30 years worth of trash along the road. He said that he was most surprised by the amount of tires that were thrown out.

“A lot of the stuff we were unearthing was pretty old stuff, but nobody had just taken the initiative to go down and do it yet, to clean it up, and that’s when we came in,” Hensley said. “Some household garbage was buried, there was some appliances that had been left over the hillside that people have thrown outside of trucks and vehicles.”

Hensley said he would like to branch out to Fentress and Pickett counties after the pick-up at the first location is completed. He said there is still a lot of work to be done at the initial site first.

“We’d like to do one in June and it would continue from where we left off on Craven’s town road,” Hensley said. “So we would go up into the actual little town of Craven’s town and go on down Cooktown road.”

Hensley said the group’s goal is to do one cleanup every month.