MuniMan
Well-Known Member
There’s been 10” of rain in Sterling Forest so far this month. That includes the 2+ inches that fell last night. I took a walk on McKeags/Redback/Hutch and Augusta Mine this morning. While some places that have been worked on are holding up well, parts of the trails are definitely being damaged by all of the rain. Lots of tread had been eroded and lost. They are not impervious everywhere, despite all the effort that has been done to make it so. There’s just too much runoff. It’s wetter than I’ve ever seen it.
There are many places where water is following the trail and washing it out instead of running off. Generally it’s getting caused by leaf litter building up on the edges of the trail making a tiny berm or dike. Then if the water gets a clear path down the trail it starts running and washing it out deeper. Add some bike or foot traffic when it’s soft and it gets a little deeper. Repeat the cycle with rain and use and the trail becomes an eroded trench.
Thank you everybody for not riding this morning. It was just me and the dogs out there today. Please give the trails many more days to dry out.
A few of us will be out this weekend to work some trouble spots on Augusta Mine. There’s places where the water took out a good amount of tread. I kicked and raked out some leaves today
But we really need to get back with some hoes and pick mattocks to dig out better drains and re-contour some of the bench cuts.
Last photo is on the recently approved section of new trail. It’s downstream from the stream crossing by the job box on Redback.
Yes we will need a bridge here.
There are many places where water is following the trail and washing it out instead of running off. Generally it’s getting caused by leaf litter building up on the edges of the trail making a tiny berm or dike. Then if the water gets a clear path down the trail it starts running and washing it out deeper. Add some bike or foot traffic when it’s soft and it gets a little deeper. Repeat the cycle with rain and use and the trail becomes an eroded trench.
Thank you everybody for not riding this morning. It was just me and the dogs out there today. Please give the trails many more days to dry out.
A few of us will be out this weekend to work some trouble spots on Augusta Mine. There’s places where the water took out a good amount of tread. I kicked and raked out some leaves today
But we really need to get back with some hoes and pick mattocks to dig out better drains and re-contour some of the bench cuts.
Last photo is on the recently approved section of new trail. It’s downstream from the stream crossing by the job box on Redback.
Yes we will need a bridge here.
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