The Buffalo Run whole: the county's one cooperative trail

item 3 — name, club, route and mileages, carried at county size

St. Joseph County has one designated snowmobile trail, and it is a state-system trail: the Buffalo Run Snowmobile Trail, one of the four trails the Indiana Snowmobilers Association lists as provided "through the cooperation of local snowmobile clubs, the Indiana Snowmobile Association, and the Department of Natural Resources." Its club is the Michiana Trail Riders Coalition, Inc. (MTRC) — "maintained by the Michiana Trail Riders Coalition, Inc. and funded through the Indiana DNR," in the DNR map's own line — and the DNR's 2025–2027 program manual carries the coalition among its four contracted club systems. Its route is the county's west side, run mostly north and south in the trail literature's summary: from the state-line country at the county's north, past Bendix Woods and the Westfield ground, to its Crumstown end — the DNR map plots the line across the county's western townships with its caution crossings marked, at U.S. Highway 20 by Taylor Ditch and at State Road 2, and names its working points on the ground, among them the American Legion Post 297 in New Carlisle and JJ's Crumstown Tavern on Crumstown Highway in North Liberty, with the trailhead signed at the Crumstown end. The trail is a leased trail, not a park trail: "State snowmobile trails are located on leased trail easements across private property," the map's regulations state, with the standing orders that give the system its shape — trails open December 1 to March 31 only when posted as open, all snowmobiles registered, all Indiana snowmobile laws (IC 14-16-1) obeyed, and do not leave the marked trail. Its published mileages print UNRECONCILED: the Indiana Snowmobilers Association carries the Buffalo Run at 63 miles; the Indiana DNR carries it at 68 miles — on the current trail map (last updated 1/8/2026), in the 2025–2027 program manual's contract table (Buffalo Run 68, of a 195-mile four-system total), and in the Department's 2015 season release, which already printed "the 68-mile Buffalo Run Trail in western St. Joseph County." A 70-mile figure carried in older test wording for this section was not found in any carrier read and is not printed as a figure. The county's one trail thus stands whole: one name, one club, one western route, and two live mileages that their carriers do not reconcile.

Sources:

1. Indiana DNR, Buffalo Run Snowmobile Trail map (last updated 1/8/2026) — the 68-mile figure; MTRC maintenance and DNR funding; the regulations block (season, registration, IC 14-16-1, leased easements, marked-trail rule); the route points and caution crossings named.
2. Indiana Snowmobilers Association (indianasnowmobilers.com), Trails — the Buffalo Run at 63 miles, "developed by the Michiana Trail Riders Coalition west of South Bend in St. Joseph County"; the four-trail DNR-cooperative frame.
3. Indiana DNR, Snowmobile Trails Program Manual 2025–2027 — the club contracts table: Buffalo Run 68 miles; the four-system total 195 miles.
4. Indiana DNR news release, "Indiana snowmobile season begins Dec. 1, 2015" (as republished) — the 68-mile Buffalo Run Trail in western St. Joseph County.
5. Treadworld, "The Best Snowmobile Trails in Indiana" (2022) — the route summarized as running mostly north and south, near South Bend and New Carlisle (secondary strength).