Golden – One day in August more than 360 people hiked the Mount Bierstadt trail attempting to bag what is considered one of Colorado’s easiest 14,000-foot peaks.
That is too many people, said Ralph Swain, wilderness program manager for the U.S. Forest Service’s Rocky Mountain region.
Mount Bierstadt, part of the Mount Evans Wilderness Area, is among the nine wilderness “magnet” areas Forest Service officials say are seeing huge increases in use.
The others are Eagles Nest, Weminuche, Indian Creek, Sangre de Cristo, Lost Creek, Holy Cross, Collegiate Peaks and Maroon Bells-Snowmass.
Rangers tell of eroding and damaged hiking trails, denuded campsites, “Charmin flowers” of discarded toilet paper and mounds of human waste.
“It’s death by 1,000 cuts,” Swain said.
In April, Forest Service officials gathered people from various outdoor user-groups to help them find a solution.
Tuesday, the group presented the agency with a list of 51 recommendations – saying that initially, data must be compiled to determine how many people are using the areas and how much damage is being wrought.
Possible solutions to reduce the numbers of hikers could be moving trailheads so that easy trails become more difficult, banning dogs and campfires at certain altitudes and limiting group sizes at campsites.
As a last resort the group said the Forest Service should examine requiring permits for overused areas.
“That is a big deal with this group,” said Mark Hesse of the Rocky Mountain Field Institute. “We struggled with that but we couldn’t back away from it.”
Overnight permits in Colorado are required only in the Indian Peaks Wilderness Area – adjacent to Rocky Mountain National Park – from June 1 to Sept. 15.
“You have to do something,” said T.J. Rapoport, director of the Colorado Fourteeners Initiative. “There is no easy answer. There are areas where it is already too late.”
Each wilderness area that has restrictions pushes recreationalists to other areas – creating more problems, he said.
The group urged Forest Service officials to appeal to Congress for more money for wilderness areas, specifically to add rangers.
Four years ago, wilderness areas in the Forest Service’s Rocky Mountain Region received about $3.5 million in annual funding, Swain said. That has been cut by $1 million, he said.
In 2002, two to three rangers were assigned to each of the region’s 46 wilderness areas, Swain said. Today, that number has dropped to about one to two rangers.
Seven wilderness areas have no ranger at all, Swain said.
The next step, said Regional Forester Rick Cables, is to sift through the recommendations, reconvene the group and come up with a final plan.
“This is a case where we have people loving the land to death,” Cables said.
Staff writer Jeremy P. Meyer may be reached at 303-954-1367 or jpmeyer@denverpost.com.
