We'll see what happens on Memorial Day weekend. "It's up to the Feds!" Word is they are NOT paving those 2 sections, unless they use 'grindings' as the land/hillside in those sections is unstable and not worth paving.
I was up the Middle Fork Road yesterday, May 10th. The contractor was working on the first section of the unpaved road past the Mail Box Peak trailhead. They had blue topped the road and a road grader was spending gravel prior to when it will be paved. So now this section of the road is smooth to drive. I talked to one of the workers and he said they will be blasting the rock face next to the road to widen the road bed. He also mentioned that they would be starting to grade the second section near the Upper CCC Trail trailhead that is full of big potholes today May 11th. It would also need to be blue topped and graveled prior to paving with ACP.
Also note: the Granite Creek Connector Trail is now closed. The DNR contractor has begun the construction of the new parking lot and driveway from the Middle Fork Road plus a new restroom just south of the "Big Bridge" over the Mid Fork Snoq. River. They have heavy equipment working in the area and are parking some of their trucks along the Middle Fork Road. It will be several weeks before the trail is reopened.
If anyone is heading across the Taylor River bridge...take a shovel and spend a few minutes working on those *^&%$ç-ing potholes to smooth them out. I did a little shoveling there a few weeks ago and it helped a bit.
I traded some e-mail with the ranger and got the impression that when the volunteer program starts up, they may be directed to that spot to do a little pick and shovel work since the road project doesn't go across the bridge.
"The essential American soul is hard, isolate, stoic, and a killer. It has never yet melted." - D.H. Lawrence
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"The essential American soul is hard, isolate, stoic, and a killer. It has never yet melted." - D.H. Lawrence
The USFS just completed three days of work on the Taylor-to-Dingford section of the Middle Fork road. That's all the road maintenance there will be here for a while because of budget constraints. There was no money for a grader so most of the roadway is exactly the way it was with numerous small pot holes. They took care of the washouts, smoothed the roughest sections, filled the biggest pot holes, cleaned out culverts, cleared old cut up blowdown from the road margin, and removed hazard trees. Until there's another big rain storm to deepen the big potholes, a normal passenger car could probably make it to the Dingford trailhead if driven with care.
On the same day the last long unpaved section of the lower road was "chip-sealed" with asphalt and gravel and is remarkably smooth.
That leaves just a very short section of gravel road by the TANW1 gaging station. The cliff there needs to be blasted back which will probably mean some short road closures. The WFLHD calendar doesn't show any closures for June and July (other than up to 60-minute waits) but that may change.
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