[aestivate]

[sailBOI]

[sailBOI]

I had addressed these issues previously in this thread.

[aestivate]

[sailBOI]

[phillyjon]

[phillyjon]

If anyone is still looking at this thread; Can you tell me if the Dosewallipes Rd. is paved to the washout. Can it be driven in a low-clearance car? Thank You And thank you for responding to my earlier post, Sailboi. Sorry for the over-zealous skeptism. I should check it out first.

[sailBOI]

[phillyjon]

Thanx, SB. I'll be doing it the first reasonably warm day, when I find out the snow has risen, and the paved RD. doesn't have frost early in morning. I'm a fair weather hiker.

[summithound]

I did a hike up to Lake Constance last summer and I just parked at the washout and rode my bike to the trailhead where I locked it up and was on my way. What sucks is that I'm not going to be able to do any hikes up there this summer though because my bike got stolen in Seattle last Friday so I have no transportation to the trailheads except walking but that takes too long. I wanted to do some hikes up to Calypso Falls at the end of the Dosewallips Road but looks like that's not going to happen this year.

[jimmymac]

Try to hit a stolen property auction for a cheap trail bike.

[Don]

I find it fascinating that I agree with the points made by every single post I have read in this thread, which certainly states the conflict at hand. The Dosewallips washout has been compared to the West Side Road closure in MRNP. The first time I hiked to Klapatchie Park in 2.5 hours without bike, I realized that road never should have been built. It was an over-ambitious mistake. I can't imagine them one day opening the flood gates and allowing people to drive to within one hour of such an incredible area in absolute droves. Klapatchie Park and St. Andrews Park would not be able to handle the crowds, in my opinion. The Dosewallips is completely opposite. There are no short day trips at the end of this road that actually reach a destination (Lake Constance is not at the end of the road - thank goodness, so that I may stress my point!). I'm a runner and very ambitious hiker/climber. Last January a buddy of equal physical condition and I failed to reach Constance Pass on a day hike (in May + conditions) due to time constraints - and we road bikes up the road. At some point, the issues of conservation have to fade. To cut an entire area of ONP off to visitors other than the fittest of the fittest has to become an issue of discrimination by the legal sense, or simply one of being taken advantage of by our own principals in the common sense. As hard as it it for me to say, at some point we should not be willing to concede due to the interests of "governmental spending for the sake of the environment". I don't believe the land is the issue at hand here. I believe we have experienced a defect in materials AND workmanship. I suggest we pursue repairs under warranty. Any backers?

[phillyjon]

I'm usually knee-jerk defensive about preserving every stitch of old-growth left in the state, especially since taxpayers have to build the roads for timber companies to harvest it. However, the proposed road detour around the washout on Dosewallips River Road has given me pause. The forest there looks to be around 250-300 years old, with some healthy specimens of Douglas Fir. It would certainly make a nice trail, and the road up to the park passes some tremendous cascades on the Dosewallips, which apparently roars this time of year. This is all fine for the young, and not so young, avid hikers. But is it fair? Everybody in the United States pays for the National Parks, and as seanic as the road may be, it is not wilderness. There has always been access to that campground in the park for the elderly and challenged, and for people who traditionally access the park from there. For the more fit seeking isolation they're free to go as far in as they could ever want. It's a big park. And we won't have to expend 5 miles of energy on a road walk. One time is enough, please. To close off forever a once accessible spot on the eastern border of ONP seems to me a little exclusive. And some of us are not getting any younger, either. Furthermore, no one even knew there were big trees in the area of the proposed road until the original road washed out. I suppose there could be an argument about the expense of maintaining the road-I noticed sections after the washout, especially near the tumbling Dosewallops, that would need regular maintenance. But what the hell, let the timber company get the big bonus trees this time. There will be plenty of threatened cuts across the state that will take priority over this one.

[Lagerman]

---> = >

[Ski]

I'm a bit dismayed to hear the Dosewallips Road hasn't yet been repaired. I'm horrified that the continued closure is due to a ill-informed, however well intentioned elitist minority, the members of which believe the trails in National Parks and National Forests are the exclusive domain of those physically capable of the additional challenge of 3 or 4 or 5 miles of hiking on rough gravel roadbeds. It was never the intention of the U.S. Congress, in creating our Parks or National Forests, to make them accessible only to those who are in prime physical condition, or who have the time available to squeeze that extra distance into a day-hike or weekend outing. Rather, those areas were created for the use and enjoyment of the PUBLIC, which includes children, the elderly, and the physically challenged. What is ignored in the debate over road closures is the detrimental effect they have on other nearby areas, as hikers are displaced to other areas which otherwise would probably not see such heavy user loads. Additionally, leaving buildings without maintenance, repair, or law enforcement miles away from the nearest road access results in the destruction, by vandalism or nature, of expensive structures, equipment, and facilities. A prime example of this was the virtual destruction of most of the Park buildings at the end of the Carbon River Road several years back. Granted, the construction of the West Side Road at MRNP ( and its original plan of a "highway around the mountain" ) was a hare-brained scheme from the start. Still, driving up to Klapatchie Point to watch the sun set was one of my favorite drives 30 years ago. At present, all that vehicle traffic is now restricted to the road up to Paradise, which on any given summer weekend is generally bumper-to-bumper, creating a traffic nightmare in an area which should be providing solitude. Presently, the Queets River Road is closed about 5 miles from the trailhead, requiring one to walk an additional 2 or 3 hours just to get to the river ford, which by mid-day can be considerably higher than it would be during the early morning. The Ranger Station has been broken into, but fortunately the damage to the structure was minimal. Not only is Park property at greater risk, but also hikers. The closure of the Queets River Road and the lack of access to the campground will result in that user group being displaced, probably to the tiny North Fork Quinault campground, or possibly Graves Creek, or the already-overcrowded circus at Kalaloch. Perhaps it is the goal of groups such as NWEA to squeeze an ever-increasing user group into fewer and fewer available areas, leaving them a greater share of wilderness for their own personal enjoyment. Road washouts in Western Washington are a naturally occuring event, and should be addressed as such. The argument concerning "unstable slopes" is specious at best. Is there anyone who can show me a road, anywhere on NPS or NFS land, constructed within a river valley, that was NOT built on "unstable slopes" ? If we were to follow the course now being taken by groups such as NWEA to its ultimate end, virtually every road within NFS or NPS lands would be closed.