2021 USFS Climbing Access Technician Recap
REI grant funds enabled the local climbing advocacy and stewardship non-profit, the Salt Lake Climbers Alliance, to facilitate and fund a Climbing Access Technician position within the Salt Lake Ranger District of the United States Forest Service on the Uinta Wasatch Cache National Forest for 60 days. The Wasatch and its climbing areas are being highly impacted from a lack of recreation infrastructure to handle the increase of use from climbers. The outdoor environment where Utahns and visitors love to play is under immense stress from increased use leading to poor watershed health and environmental impacts are constantly on the rise. The goal of the position is to support the planning processes required under the National Environmental Protection Act for climbing resource improvements and maintenance at popular climbing areas in the Wasatch. This effort lays the groundwork for the SLCA to implement stewardship projects in conjunction with the Forest Service in order to reduce human impacts on the natural environment. If we as a user group fail to act now, access and appeal to the places we love to climb will be diminished. This is the third year for this position to exist with proven success. The SLCA’s effort to continue this position within the Forest Service will help plan for and ultimately protect Wasatch climbing and the natural environment.
The 2021 USFS Climbing Access Technician’s season was focused on providing crew oversight and project management for the reroute of the upper Jacob's Ladder trail. This trail provides access to Lone Peak Cirque, a highly popular alpine climbing and hiking area in the Uinta Wasatch Cache National Forest. The proximity to a major urban area and increase in use have greatly accelerated erosion of this unsustainable trail that now has erosion up to six feet deep! The trail's destination is the summit of Lone Peak (11,260 feet) and it gains 5,600 feet of elevation over six miles from the Peak View Trail Head. The worst part of this approach is this middle section, where 1.3 miles of a section known as (upper) Jacobs Ladder gains 2,200 feet, with an average grade of 32%+. To address this concern and to improve the recreation experience of hikers and climbers, we will construct a three mile reroute. The new segment will switch back across the slope rather than climbing directly up it, allowing for frequent drainage opportunities and thus decreased erosion. The new trail will average a 15% grade rather than 32%+ grade. It will also include closure of the old trail once complete.
Planning for this project began in 2018 and in September of this year professional trail crews were finally able to break ground. This position spent the beginning of the season flagging the new alignment for the contracted professional trail crew to build. The second half of the season was dedicated to helping the crew with project logistics and ensuring the build was meeting USFS trail standards. The crew was able to put in 4,352 linear ft of new and improved trail which will be finished in 2022.
The Climbing Access Technician also continued to monitor the progress of future project goals for climbing in the Wasatch. These include improvement proposals for American Fork climbing access, a Uinta Wasatch Cache National Forest Climbing Management Plan, a minimum tool analysis for anchor maintenance options in American Fork Wilderness and lastly, strategizing how to best accomplish climbing improvement projects in Big Cottonwood Canyon, Utah just minutes from Salt Lake City.
Prepared by Lindsay Anderson, USFS Climbing Access Technician and Julia Geisler, Executive Director of the Salt Lake Climbers Alliance
December 8, 2021
