Comments on Trail 13, 14 Planning Eldorado Mountain

This is a comment on your Trail 13/14 EM/DD TSA planning process that I would like entered into the official record.

First, I would like to thank the Open Space and Mountain Parks Department for arranging another one of its trail alignment, walk-through, field trips. I think that this is a vastly preferable way of gathering public input — one that could also be applied to other, more general policy discussions. The advantage of this process is that it permits and encourages multiple in-depth conversations and gets us out of the public meeting trap of simply exchanging "zinger" sound bites. In the course of a couple hours of walking together you learn a lot more about each other's views, a lot more about what you have in common, and the real nature of your disagreements. While agreement will certainly still be quite elusive, I think that this process focuses the debate much for more sharply on the real issues.

I don't think that you need to exactly walk the trail alignment, however. As you know, in the absence of a trail, these routes can be difficult going for many people. I think that you could get the same sort of in-depth feel for alternative trail alignments by allowing people avoid difficult and an environmentally damaging sections by taking detours which lead people to key viewpoints where they easily see the lines of flagging that mark the proposed trail alignment. Still, I think it's a good idea to walk the trail alignment wherever possible.

In terms of the general alignment for the new trail, I favor the eastern, #14 upper, "through the trees" option followed by the western, #13 lower, option across the wide open mesa top with big views. On some of the long sidehills it may, however, be appropriate to move the trail further up the slope to reduce exposure to the ultra mud of the Pierre Shale.

As I've argued many times before, I think that it's also important to include, at key spots along the trail, inspirational sitting points (with perhaps with strategically repositioned logs or sitting rocks) that would encourage people to sit for a moment and reflect upon and enjoy the area.

I also think that you need to add, on this trail (and other points around the entire OSMP system system) interpretive signs focused on helping people understand the magic of the place. While "don't do this" signs are, of course, needed, the focus of the interpretive signs I'm proposing would be much more positive and could play a critical role in helping people appreciate the poorly understood prairie (and, to a lesser extent, forest) ecosystems. In order to keep costs and visual clutter down, I think you could use very simple and small signs with numbers indicating that there's something interesting here and that you can find out what it is by downloading a brochure from the OSMP website (or picking on up at the trailhead.

A big topic of conversation on the field trip was the assertion that there were terrible environmental impacts associated with just about every option. While I'm all for limiting these impacts as much as possible, I think that you need to keep honestly asking yourself just how serious these impacts really are. There really ought to be in alignment that allows you to build this trail with only the most minor adverse environmental impacts — impacts that are far outweighed by visitor benefits and opportunities for building ecological connections between humans and the natural world.

-- Guy Burgess