Mission impassable: Get to wilds

In a matter of weeks, Washington could get its long-awaited Wild Sky Wilderness, a 106,500-acre swath of Cascade mountains and forests in Snohomish County coveted because it's so easy for regular folks to get there.

Trouble is, most of it is extremely hard to reach right now.

Last November's flooding on the north fork of the Skykomish River gouged huge chunks from the main road that leads into the area, a few miles outside the hamlet of Index. There's a long way around that goes deeper into the woods, but flood damage blocks that road several miles short of some of the most popular trails.

It's only part of a much larger problem. All around Western Washington, hikers, equestrians and others headed for the woods this spring and summer face a maze of closed roads and washed-out trails. And the Mount Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest, where the Wild Sky Wilderness would be, has some of the worst of it.

While the region's attention after last fall's epic storms focused on the plight of Mount Rainier National Park, many of the state's most popular national-forest lands have also been seriously damaged.

In some places as many as half the trails are inaccessible or impassable. And while they tend to be less revered, national forests, particularly the Mount Baker-Snoqualmie, are actually more heavily traveled than the national parks.

As Mount Rainier has gotten millions of dollars for repairs, the forests have been largely left out, even as they struggle for money for routine maintenance. As a result, repairs could be years away in many cases, if they happen at all. That's particularly true for trails, which don't qualify for federal highway money.

"The overall picture is: The access to trailheads is the worst it's been in I don't know how long," said Gary Paull, the wilderness and trail coordinator for the Mount Baker-Snoqualmie.

"A long time. Ever."

Washed out, blocked off

In the Mount Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest, you can't drive to a single major trailhead leading into the Glacier Peak Wilderness in the remote Cascade Mountains northeast of Everett; all the roads are closed.

A popular trail to an abandoned mining town called Monte Cristo, outside Granite Falls, remains blocked by a mudslide and a washout. Part of a bridge to the Big Four Ice Caves, one of the most frequently visited trails in the Mount Baker-Snoqualmie, is now a twisted metal skeleton. Road damage has turned a mile-and-a-half hike to the Evergreen Mountain fire-lookout cabin off Highway 2 into a 10-mile trek.

Farther south, near Interstate 90, the road to the Talapus Lake Trail is blocked, adding four miles to a round-trip hike. Still farther south, near Mount Rainier, the heavily-used Skookum Flats trail has several major washouts.

So far, the trail repairs in the Mount Baker-Snoqualmie alone are expected to cost $5.2 million, and that bill will probably rise when melting snow reveals more trouble, said Paull. Total damage to Oregon and Washington national forest roads, trails and other facilities is estimated at $37 million, with the highest price tags in Washington's Mount Baker-Snoqualmie and Gifford Pinchot national forests.

That's far more than the combined trail construction budget for every national forest in those two states, where funding has fallen from roughly $4 million in 2000 to $1 million this year, Paull said. In the past, trail budgets were filled partly with money from timber sales. That money has dried up as logging ended in many areas.

For now, Paull and other forest officials rely on money earned from selling trailhead parking passes, along with some grants, to supplement their shrinking budget. All told, he has about $1.75 million per year for all trail-related work.

Volunteer helpers

So Paull is counting on people like Jim Knoke, a 71-year-old retired Boeing engineer from Shoreline.

Last Wednesday, Knoke shoveled mud from a 4-foot-deep pit in the Boulder River trail, west of Darrington.

Knoke was one of nine volunteers from the Washington Trails Association who had come to patch storm damage. In this case it was caused by a giant tree with roots that had ripped up part of the trail when it tumbled to the ground.

They are among hundreds of volunteers who have been scrambling to help keep trails open by filling holes, sawing up fallen trees and rebuilding walkways. Knoke said he tries to lend a hand once a week.

"If it wasn't for the volunteers, a lot of this wouldn't get done for a while," Knoke said.

Now Congress may offer a hand. Norm Dicks, D-Bremerton, last week included $65 million for forest road and trail repairs nationwide in the Interior Department budget just passed by a House appropriations subcommittee he leads.

It was prompted by reports that collapsing forest roads are hurting streams and that storm damage and delayed maintenance are keeping people out, Dicks said.

"We're trying to fix some of these problems," he said. "This is just a start."

Ditch some roads

Some environmentalists are urging the Forest Service to just dismantle some damaged roads to reduce the risk that they will wash out and cause further environmental harm.

"It doesn't make sense to keep replacing them again and again and again," said Rick McGuire of the Alpine Lakes Protection Society, a local environmental group that focuses on the central Cascades. "They need to step back and do a real assessment of what we can afford to keep up in the future."

In fact, this year the agency will start planning to shrink the trail system from the roughly 24,000 miles of pathways to something it can afford to maintain, said Chuck Frayer, who helps oversee the trail system from the Forest Service's regional office in Portland. The forest officials will be asking trail users for input.

"They're probably not going to like what they're going to hear," Frayer said. "But I think it's time to be upfront and as honest as we can be with what the numbers are."

In the meantime, the U.S. Senate is expected to vote soon on creation of the Wild Sky Wilderness. It would protect national forest land just north of Highway 2 near the towns of Index and Skykomish, banning mining, logging and motorized recreational vehicles. The House already passed the bill, and the president is expected to sign it.

But that won't mean the roads will reopen soon. The main route past Index, Snohomish County's Index-Galena Road, might not be fixed for five or six years, said county engineer Owen Carter.

As for the Forest Service road to the more popular trailheads, be patient, says Tom Davis, a trails specialist for the Skykomish Ranger District.

"It doesn't sound like anytime soon."

Warren Cornwall: 206-464-2311 or wcornwall@seattletimes.com