NCCC forum considers flood of hikers

KEENE VALLEY | Well-intended efforts to scatter the crowds flocking to the Adirondack High Peaks have to date mostly resulted in the creation of new problems, or created new trouble spots in the park, a panel of experts said during an online North Country Community College forum Thursday (March 4). "Even though we think we're doing justice, we're just moving these problems to different areas of the park," said Chelsea Walker, an Adirondack guide who moderates a backcountry social media page. Hikers who once numbered in the thousands on popular mountain trails now number in the tens of thousands, threatening the ecology and pounding antique trails not designed to handle such loads into a pulp. Department of Environmental Conservation Ranger Scott van Laer said swarms of crowds have endangered the hiker themselves. Search and rescue efforts have more than doubled in the High Peaks, and parking areas at popular trailheads have become dangerous, as evidenced by skid marks on the pavement. The state tried to limit hikers by prohibiting roadside parking for miles along Rt. 73 In Keene Valley. Undeterred, however, hikers simply parked further away and walked three or four abreast in the middle of the road. Van Laer said there has been progress from the days when pits were dynamited in the wilderness for hikers to dispose of their garbage, and campers scoured the ground for firewood. Both practices are no longer allowed. But other efforts have fallen short, most notably an effort by the state and conservation groups to disperse the crowds in the High Peaks by sending them to other trailheads. Today, these once-lonely trails are becoming overused themselves. The Jay Range, which includes a stunning, mile-long hike along a mostly open ridgeline, was a sure way to find solitude not that many years ago. But where it might have had five to 10 hikers over a summer weekend, today it has more than 100. "When I started here, nobody was on the Jay Range," van Lear said. "But (promotion of Jay Mountain) is having an impact on what was a very pristine area. I'm not sure dispersal is the answer." Keene Supervisor Joe Pete Wilson said, for him, Owl's Head just off of Rt. 73 represented a "time-lapse" photograph of a wooded peak whose tries died and soils eroded over years of use. And pushing people away only created other troubles. "What I learned the hard way as supervisor was that if you try to manage just one trouble spot you just push the problem down the road," he said. Wilson agreed that state parking enforcement was having minimal effect. "There's no way we're going to tow our way out of the parking problem," he said. Although not universally popular, limiting the number of hikers by instituting a permit system has drawn increasing support from conservationists as the ultimate, and perhaps only, way to solve the problem. Willie Janeway, whose Adirondack Council supports permitting, said limits on group hiking and on scavenging firewood have worked, and that permits are standard at other national attractions. "It's not a big secret what needs to be done moving forward," he said. "Most people understand it's what we need to do." What's at stake, Janeway said, is the greatest unbroken hardwood forest on earth, and preservation of this resource should be primary consideration. "Maintaining the ecological integrity and wild character is essential," he said. NCCC mathematics professor Pete Nelson said a permit system is "not that simple," and that crowds have a way of overwhelming good intentions. "To tie it to numbers of users is tricky," he said. The combination of crowds and bad trails can "overwhelm any kind of policy you can think of putting in place." Nelson said limits should correspond to data, and should be enforceable when the numbers show that natural resources, such as wildlife, are being adversely affected. But while opinion on solutions may vary, Nelson said there's one area of agreement: "There's nothing like this place anywhere on earth."

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NCCC forum considers flood of hikers

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