Roads through the Western National Parks: Struggling against Nature

 

“This Park was created, and is now administered for the benefit and enjoyment of the people. The government must continue to appropriate for it, especially in the direction of completing and perfecting an excellent system of driveways.”

--- President Theodore Roosevelt at the Dedication of the Roosevelt Arch
Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming
April 24, 1903

 
 As I write this, it’s around 40° in New Jersey and the roads are crowded with cars, people are shopping, returning unwanted gifts, or getting ready for their New Year's Eve celebrations. My thoughts, however, are in Yellowstone National Park, where it's -13° F. All is quiet under the snow except for the hissing of steam and bubbling mudpots. The loop roads through Yellowstone have been closed to vehicles for months, except for one. The road across the northern part of the park, from the North Entrance to Cooke City, Montana, is the only one that the park service will continue plow over the winter months.

The story is similar to that of many western mountain parks. Glacier, Mount Rainier, Crater Lake, Lassen Volcanic, King’s Canyon and Sequoia, and Rocky Mountain National Parks -- all either allow only limited access or close roads to vehicular traffic entirely until late spring, when the snows finally retreat.

My musings on winter road conditions in the western national parks may seem a bit misplaced for this New Jerseyan, especially since we so recently endured a traffic nightmare from our own record-setting “Christmas Weekend Blizzard.” However, the study of roads through the parks was a major focus of my trip there last summer. My work as a historic preservation consultant often requires me to study the history and design of what we call “engineering resources” - bridges, roads, dams, and other elements of infrastructure. The roads in particular have always intrigued me: How have we learned over time to transport people and goods expeditiously over long distances and difficult terrain?

To prepare for the trip, I had dutifully studied the history of the parks movement and a little about the state of the roads in 1920, the year of the National Park-to-Park Highway Dedication Tour, the route I would follow. Nothing I had read, however, had totally prepared me for the challenges that faced roadbuilding and maintenance efforts in the western region. These become clear only when you actually see them for yourself.

Road tunnel through rock outcrop near Box Canyon, Mount Rainier National Park

Most of the national parks I visited are part of the mountainous spine of the North American Continent known as the Western Cordillera. It is composed of numerous mountain ranges; the Cascades, the Rockies, the Sierra Nevadas are among the well-recognized names. They are largely composed of rock – all kinds: sedimentary, metamorphic and igneous. The roads often cling to rock faces of these mountains, which rise straight up from the edge of the road until they disappear from sight hundreds of feet above you. On the other side of the road is often a precipitous slope to a valley hundreds of feet below you. The roads traverse glacial moraines, canyons, and areas punctuated by potentially lethal thermal features such as colored hot springs, bubbling mudpots, and steaming fumaroles.
 

Road along Yellowstone River, Yellowstone National Park

As a result of these harsh conditions, the roads through America's western national parks demand careful thought and engineering. Not only must the roads negotiate extremely rugged terrain, they must stand up to the rigorous demands of climate, weather, and geology. Events such as landslides, torrential rains and floods, fires, and even seismic or volcanic activities continue to cause major damage to roads throughout the park system over time, damage that must be repaired to keep the parks open to visitors. And then there are the visual characteristics of the road system: the National Park Service guidelines require that roads through the parks be unobtrusive, never detracting from the scenic wonders that they serve and otherwise being visually compatible with the natural environment.

Last but not least, the roads must also withstand the impact of the vehicles used by millions of visitors every year. Cars, motorcycles, RVs, trucks, and bicycles – a very diverse collection of vehicle sizes, weights, speeds and vulnerability seeks safe passage through the parks via the roads. As the early founders of the parks learned, good roads to and through the parks are critical to the public's appreciation of these unique areas.

Traffic on Going-to-the-Sun Road, Glacier National Park

Because these parks are located in the mountains, the summer offers only a very short period during which road construction activities can be carried out. Many of the roads in the mountainous parks are closed by September or October due to heavy snow, and may not open again until late May or even early July. Even in mid-July 2010, fully one quarter of the Crater Lake National Park Rim Road was still closed due to snow. That same month, I saw a 6 – 10 feet snow pack along the sides of the road in areas of Mount Rainier, Glacier, and Lassen Volcanic National Parks.

Snow along road in July 2010. Lassen Volcanic National Park

However, the period from mid-June to mid-September also is when most visitors come to the parks. Road congestion is inevitable and, in recent years, expected. From the National Park Traveler’s website: 

“[In 2010] Yellowstone set a record with more than 3.6 million visitors, Glacier set a record with more than 2.2 million, Yosemite closed in on 4 million visitors, as did Grand Canyon. And Great Smoky Mountains National Park had a strong year with some 9.5 million visitors despite a year often  marked by road construction and detours. And those were just the name-brand parks." [“Looking Back on 2010 Across the National Park System: National Parks were Popular.” National Park Traveler (December 31, 2010)].

Among the original 12 parks I toured this summer, all had ongoing major road repair projects. Only two newer parks in California - Joshua Tree NP (created 1994) and Redwoods State and National Parks (created 1968; expanded 1978) – were free of construction when I passed through.

In Yellowstone, the change in road alignment and new bridge over the Gibbon River was completed in late October 2010, after tying up traffic between Norris and Madison for more than a year. The improvement is more than just a new bridge, however.

Road realignment and construction of new bridge over Gibbon River, Yellowstone National Park

According to the National Park Service:

"Wetlands, rare plants, thermal areas, and even the path of the Gibbon River itself were disturbed when the old road was built in the 1930s. Work is now underway to remove the old road and bridge and restore the 2-mile section of river corridor.

The land along the river is being reshaped back to the way it was before the old road was built, and thousands of native plants grown from seed are being planted in the area. When completed, about  three acres of wetland habitat will have been restored. [News Release, Yellowstone National Park,  WY, National Park Service, September 1, 2010]."

In Glacier National Park, the remarkable Going-to-the-Sun Road is undergoing an extensive rehabilitation, which is occurring over several years. During the planning and environmental impact assessment stages in the early 2000s, extensive public opinion guided the Park service to the preferred alternative of “Shared Use” during the height of the visitor season, mid-June to mid-September. This means that the formidable numbers of vehicles passing through the park, like many other national parks, are subjected to alternating one-way traffic in construction zones and sometimes  considerable waits. In the months immediately before and after the peak visitor period, the road is closed to permit accelerated construction activity.

In December 2010, the Zion-Mt. Carmel Highway from Canyon Junction to the east entrance of Zion National Park was closed due to flooding that undermined a section of the roadway. That highway is also undergoing its first extensive rehabilitation in 8 decades, which will take place over several years. 

Along the Zion-Mt. Carmel Road, Zion National Park

At Mount Rainier, work is still being done on the Nisqually Road, much of which was washed out in 2006. The current work is needed after another flood in 2009 undermined and collapsed a section of the road near the National Historic Landmark District of Longmire. In fact, according to Jeffrey P. Mayor in his excellent article in the Bellingham Herald (December 6, 2010), the 18-mile road between Nisqually and the visitor center at Paradise has been often threatened in recent years by debris flows, glacial outbursts, and flooding, much of which can be attributed to climate change and the retreat of the glaciers on the mountain. The substantial economic impacts of lost revenue from the closure of this road are felt not only by the NPS, but also the local businesses that depend on visitors to the park, so it is critical to keep the park roads open. This can be expensive.

Recent repairs at Mount Rainier and other parks have been aided by partial funding of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. According to a staff member at Mesa Verde visitor center when asked about all the road projects in the parks, he replied that the National Park Service has a very vigorous planning department, which had a number of projects that were "shovel ready" and thus eligible for funding under the economic stimulus legislation. Planning efforts are ongoing, however, as is the need for funding. At Mount Rainier, a $30 Million, 3-phase plan is in the works to repave the Nisqually-Paradise road, which will need future allocations.

Glacial moraine from bridge over Nisqually River, Mount Rainier National Park

And so the story goes. Park after park; project after project - lines of traffic delays can be found in just about every park in the park system. And yet, for all the down-time waiting for your lane to get the go-ahead, for every slow ride through construction areas, for all the bumper-to-bumper traffic we endured, I never heard one word of complaint from a member of the public.

Waiting for our turn to descend the Generals Highway, Sequoia National Park

We shrugged our shoulders and bore it all rather complacently. It seems a small price to pay for the opportunity to see such wonders. We owe a lot to the hearty masons, heavy equipment operators, the flagmen and women, and the engineers who work under the doubly difficult mandate: not only to accomplish the work itself, but also to safely shepherd the public around the danger zones.

The public, from what I could see, seemed proud to have evidence that the nation is taking care of its natural heritage. And, although the amount of visitor traffic generally in the parks was somewhat daunting - I did everything possible to avoid it - the ongoing construction work was, for this road maven at least, an interesting attraction of its own.

Resources:

Culpin, Mary Shivers. The History of the Construction of the Road System in Yellowstone National  Park, 1872-1966: Historic Resource Study. Vol. 1. Selections from the Division of Cultural Resources, No. 5, Rocky Mountain Region, National Park Service, 1994. National Park Service Online Books. URL http://www.nps.gov/history/history/online_books/yell_roads/index.htm accessed December 31, 2010.

“Glacier National Park: Going-to-the-Sun Road Rehabilitation Photo Gallery.” Western Federal Lands Highway Division. Federal Highway Administration, U.S. Department of Transportation Website. URL: http://www.wfl.fhwa.dot.gov/projects/gtsr/gallery.htm accessed December 31, 2010.

“Images of the Flood of 2006.” Mount Rainier National Park. PDF booklet. Washington DC: National Park Service website. URL http://www.nps.gov/mora/parknews/images-of-the-flood-of-2006.htm accessed December 31, 2010.

Mayor, Jeffrey P. “Drivers may face delays on Nisqually Road.” The Olympian (August 29, 2010). URL: http://www.theolympian.com/2010/08/29/1350882/drivers-may-face-delays-on-nisqually.html accessed December 31, 2010.

----- “Receding glaciers on Mount Rainier threaten park's major roadways.” The News Tribune (Tacoma) (Dec. 06, 2010). Online edition. URL: http://www.bellinghamherald.com/2010/12/06/1757401/receding-glaciers-on-mount-rainier.html accessed December 31, 2010.

“Mount Rainier Receives $3.3 Million for American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 Projects.” News Release. Mount Rainier National Park, National Park Service (April 24, 2009). URL: http://www.nps.gov/mora/parknews/upload/MORA%20Gets%20$3.3%20mill.pdf accessed December 31, 2010.

Reichard, Sean. “New Bridge Opens Over Yellowstone's Gibbon River.” Yellowstone Insider. Minneapolis MN:August Publications, 2010. Online edition. URL http://www.yellowstoneinsider.com/20100712606/news/articles/new-bridge-opens-over-yellowstones-gibbon-river.php accessed December 31, 2010.

Repanshek, Kurt. “Big, Bold and Beautiful, New Road and Bridge Over Gibbon River in Yellowstone National Park is Completed.” National Parks Traveler. Website (October 25, 2010). URL: http://www.nationalparkstraveler.com/2010/10/big-bold-and-beautiful-new-road-and-bridge-over-gibbon-river-yellowstone-national-park-completed7122 accessed December 31, 2010.

----- “Looking Back on 2010 Across the National Park System: National Parks were Popular.” National Park Traveler (December 31, 2010). URL: http://www.nationalparkstraveler.com/2010/12/looking-back-2010-across-national-park-system7320 accessed December 31, 2010.

----- “Zion National Park Planning To "Rehabilitate" Mount Carmel Highway.” National Park Traveler (November 11, 2008). URL: http://www.nationalparkstraveler.com/2008/11/zion-national-park-planning-rehabilitate-mount-carmel-highway accessed December 31, 2010.

“Yellowstone National Park: Gibbon Canyon Night Closures End.” News Release. Yellowstone National Park, WY: National Park Service, U.S. Department of the Interior, September 1, 2010. Online version. URL: http://www.nps.gov/yell/10097a.htm accessed December 31, 2010.

“Zion-Mount Carmel Highway in Zion National Park Reopens.” News release. Zion National Park, UT, National Park Service (December 24, 2010). URL: http://www.nps.gov/zion/parknews/zion-mount-carmel-highway-in-zion-national-park-reopens.htm accessed December 31, 2010.

Wildflowers in the Snow

Wildflowers along the Tundra Communities Trail, Rocky Mountain National Park, CO

My childhood friend Joey, a long-time Colorado resident, tried to prepare me for the Rocky Mountain tundra. I smiled appreciatively, but had my doubts. The only tundra I knew was in Siberia. In any event, it was the middle of July, after all. How “frozen” can tundra look in the middle of summer?

Joey and I were on our way to Rocky Mountain National Park – the only one on my list of the western national parks that I hadn't yet visited.

We arrived in Estes Park, just outside the entrance, the afternoon before we scheduled our tour of the park. It was the last day of this year’s “Rooftop Rodeo,” an annual event that dominates the local scene during mid-July. Our timing couldn’t have been more perfect: we met a number of horse trailers on the road, all of which were returning home. We found a hotel room with no difficulty and immediately set off to inspect the Stanley Hotel (1909), an enormous white landmark on the hillside, and enjoyed a glass of wine on the veranda overlooking the town.
 

Rock Cut, Trail Ridge Rd., Rocky Mountain NP

The next morning, we began our trek on Trail Ridge Road over the Continental Divide. The road starts at Estes Park on the eastern boundary of the park, cuts through the middle of the reserve, and then turns south toward the community of Grand Lake on the park’s western boundary. Due to the difficult terrain and the short construction season, the road took three years to build -- from 1929 to 1933. Workers carved the road through the mountains by blasting through layers of gneiss and schist while contending with the high winds, cool temperatures, cold rain, and sometimes even snow. Reaching 12,183 feet elev., it is the highest continuously paved highway in the United States.

Some 3 million park visitors per year travel the 48-miles of Trail Ridge Road, many of them during the 8 weeks from mid-June to mid-August – that’s around 40,000 - 50,000 visitors per day (!). That sounds like a lot of traffic. However, the photos I took as we traveled through at the very height of the season show a lot of open road. There were always people around, but the park never felt overrun.

Alpine Avens, Acomastylis rossii (Rocky Mountain National Park, CO)

After a long climb up through Rock Cut, our first stop within the park was at the Tundra Communities Trail. Here at last was Joey’s Rocky Mountain Alpine Tundra, an ecosystem found above the tree line on very high mountains. There, tiny, jewel-like flowers bloom in protected rocky crevices in one of the harshest climates on earth, some 11,000 feet above sea level.

Alpine Bluebells, Mertensia alpina (Rocky Mountain National Park, CO)

 Truly one of the great miracles of survival, the alpine wildflower blooms abundantly here, despite gale force winds and heavy snowfall for much of the year. During a growing season of only a few weeks, they must emerge, bloom, set seeds and then again go dormant until the next year. It was cold and wet on the mountain that day, so I was focused on photographing them; identification would have to come later. Since then, I have put names to only a few of them: Alpine Avens, Alpine Sorrel, Elk Thistle, Alpine Bluebells (Mertensia), and a few others.

Alpine Sorrel, Oxyria digyna (Rocky Mountain National Park, CO)

Joey, used to the high altitudes, walked purposefully to the summit, while I, feeling wimpy and breathless, heeded the warnings about altitude sickness and took an easy stroll up the winding path. With camera in hand, I focused my attention on the flowers and the interpretive signs, happy to have an excuse to go slowly.

Leaving Tundra Communities Trail, we followed the road yet higher, up to the junction of Trail Ridge Road and the Old Fall River Road – the original road into the park. There the National Park Service had constructed the Alpine Visitor Center, completed in 1965. It is reported to be the highest facility of its kind in the Park Service. The center’s unique design features a heavy grid of peeled logs installed on top of the roof, which is braced from underneath by heavy timber rafters. This structural system is meant to withstand winds up to 200 mph and an annual snowfall of some 40 – 50 inches. The Park Service’s website shows how the center looks under a typical snowload. http://www.nps.gov/romo/alpine_visitor_center.htm

Alpine Visitor Center, Fall River Pass, Rocky Mountain National Park, CO (July 2010)

We spent a bit of time wandering through the visitor center and then returned to the car to begin our descent into Grand Lake. Reentering the world below the tree line seemed anticlimactic in comparison to the harsh wilderness above. And, while each national park offers its own unique treasures, the delights of Rocky Mountain National Park are hard to surpass.

 
Resources:

Buchholtz, C. W. Rocky Mountain National Park: A History. Niwot, CO: University Press of Colorado, 1983.

Dahms, David. Rocky Mountain Wildflowers – Pocket Guide. 1999. Rpt. Windsor CO: Paragon Press, 2005.

“Rocky Mountain Region.”Celebrating Wildflowers. Website. Washington DC: United States Forest Service. URL http://www.fs.fed.us/wildflowers/regions/rockymountain/index.shtml accessed November 25, 2010.

Kaiser, Harvey H. The National Park Architecture Sourcebook. New York: Princeton Architectural Press, 2008.

Laine, Don and Barbara. “Rocky Mountain National Park.” Frommer's National Parks of the American West. Hoboken NJ: Wiley Publishing, Inc. 2008.

“Rocky Mountain National Park, Colorado.” National Park Service. Official Website. URL: http://www.nps.gov/romo/index.htm accessed November 26, 2010.

Spellenberg, Richard (Prof. of Biology, New Mexico State University). Ann H. Whitman, Editor. Familiar Flowers of North America – Western Region. National Audubon Society Pocket Guide. 1986. Rpt. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2004.

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The Grand Coulee and the Carved Landscapes of Washington State

Banks Lake, near Grand Coulee, WA

On the suggestion of my friend Ben, a big-time Washington State booster, I included Grand Coulee Dam in my recent jackrabbit run through the national parks of the American West. He suspected that I couldn’t resist, since historic dams are among my favorite preservation projects. He was right about the dam - it was too tempting to miss. But nothing prepared me for what I saw after that.

Route through Grand Coulee, W

To get there, I followed scenic State Route 2 west out of Spokane, WA, passing through green rolling farmland and the small towns of Reardon and Davenport. It was Sunday morning, July 4th. The towns were exceptionally quiet, caught in the double rest-period of church services and a national holiday. At Wilbur, I detoured north towards Grand Coulee dam.

It wasn’t long before a line of utility towers crested a distant hill to my left. Another group of towers approached from the right, eventually stretching their power lines  across the road. Yet another set of lines branched  off eastward beyond it.The green and fertile uplands west of Spokane gave way to sagebrush and rocky outcrops as I descended into the Columbia River basin. Lake Roosevelt, the water impounded by the Grand Coulee dam, was the first glimpse I had of the actual river as I dropped into the valley, which was about a thousand feet lower than the farmlands. By the time I arrived at the town of Grand Coulee, just west of the dam, the air felt hot and parched. The landscape had taken on the soft colors of the desert – grey-green sage, ochre and straw-yellow grasses. Dark green pine trees stippled the banks of the river near town.

Just the Dam Facts

Grand Coulee Dam, on the Columbia River near Grand Coulee, WA

The Grand Coulee Dam is a mile-long concrete gravity dam spanning the banks of the Columbia River in eastern Washington State. It was commissioned by President Franklin Delano Roosevelt and built in the years 1933 – 1941, during the depths of the Depression. It was considered one of the brightest stars among the constellation of Roosevelt’s New Deal projects. This ambitious public works project employed several thousands of workers at a time. Its hydropower was intended to open new prosperity in the Northwest through electricity generation and irrigation of the arid lands of Eastern Washington. It was recently reported to be the fifth largest producer of electricity in the world. After its completion in 1941, it was billed as the “Eighth Wonder of the World.” And, until the completion of the Three Gorges Dam over the Yangtze River in China in 2006 some 60 years later, it held onto its record as the largest concrete structure in the world. It is still the largest concrete structure in the United States.

The Grand Coulee dam was the first of some eleven built by the federal government to harness the powerful Columbia for irrigation and electricity generation. The dams – among other things – decimated the salmon population that was the lifeblood of the Colville tribe and others, forever changing the native culture and its way of life. On the other hand, these dams put many thousands of people to work during the Depression and generate much of the electricity that powers the homes and businesses of the Northwest.

Those basic facts about the damming of the Columbia River only scratch the surface of the river's story. Each one of the sentences of the preceding paragraphs could generate a book. Some already have. The history, economics, politics and culture of this region are among the most complex, conflicted, and intertwined of any area of the United States. A wonderfully comprehensive, well-researched book on many of these topics was written by Washington native Blaine Harden under the title A River Lost: The Life and Death of the Columbia (1996).

But my visit to the dam turned out to be only the prelude to my real investigations of Grand Coulee. The 1930s dam was modern history -- a sidebar to a much older, and more curious, story of the region.

Lost in the Landscape

To find my way back south toward Route 2, I followed “Coulee Boulevard,” the road that goes through  Electric City then southwest along Banks Lake, a large reservoir that now fills the coulee. It was named for Frank A. Banks, chief construction engineer of Grand Coulee dam.

Basalt cliffs in the Grand Coulee, near Steamboat Rock State Park, WA

The landscape of Grand Coulee mystifies. Its towering sides are made of "flood basalt" that flowed across much of the region some 15 million years ago. At the north end of the reservoir, the silt floor of the coulee is well above the water line, enough to support a cluster of buildings - one of Electric City's neighborhoods.

Steamboat Rock, Banks Lake, Grand Coulee, WA

Soon after you leave the built-up area, you round the top of a hill and can look far to the southwest, where the breathtaking, vast landscape of the Grand Coulee stretches ahead for 27 miles. The wind blows constantly – at least when I was there – whirling up small dust-devils on the Steamboat Rock peninsula, which juts into the center of the Banks Lake. “What happened here?” I wondered. What are these cliffs all about?

Dust Devils, Steamboat Rock State Park, Grand Coulee, WA

I continued to follow the reservoir southwest, ending up in Coulee City, where I passed below the south end of the reservoir. In another mile, I turned southwest on Route 17, towards Ephrata. Yakima was my ultimate destination, my jumping off place for the trip into Mt. Rainier National Park.

Dry Falls Heritage Area as seen from Route 17 near Coulee City, WA

A few miles out of Coulee City, the landscape off to the east was just as curious as was the Grand Coulee. I stopped the car on a cinder pullout and looked across the top of a large sweep of barren plain, marked with more deep coulees that were carved into the landscape. I didn’t realize it then, but I was looking into the Dry Falls, a 3-1/2 mile long precipice that is thought to have been the largest one-time waterfall in the history of the world. And that opens the most intriguing story about this place.

The Ice Dam of Glacial Lake Missoula

The Grand Coulee and the Dry Falls and much of the Northwest are areas shaped by one of the most violent events of nature in the history of the world: the Ice Age Floods. First hypothesized in the 1920s by J Harlen Bretz (with no period after “J” according to his preference), the theory of ice age floods that etched devastating scars on the land was not really accepted until the 1960s. Bretz, investigating the “Scablands” of eastern Washington State, came to believe that they were the result massive floods through the area, although he couldn’t figure out where the water came from.

Later research ultimately determined that an ice dam that had built up at the mouth of the Clark Fork River near what is now Sand Point, Idaho. The resulting lake – Glacial Lake Missoula – was estimated to be 2000 feet deep and stretched eastward across southwest Montana for some 200 miles. At some point between  80,000 and 10,000 years ago, the ice dam gave way, releasing hundreds of tons of water across the northwest with incredible speed and force. From a recent study by Jones and Jones (2001), sponsored by the National Park Service:

When the highest of these ice dams failed, lake water burst through, shooting out at a rate 10 times the combined flow of all the rivers of the world. [...] This towering mass of water and ice literally shook the ground as it thundered toward the Pacific Ocean, stripping away hundreds of feet of soil and cutting deep canyons— ”coulees”—into the underlying bedrock. With flood speeds approaching 65 miles per hour, the lake would have drained in as little as 48 hours. [Jones et al., 2001: 13].

Many times over the next 2,500 years the Clark Fork dam repeatedly formed and failed, leaving its indelible marks on the scoured landscape, until finally the ice sheet retreated into Canada. Until Bretz, apparently, no one had put all this together. In recent decades, a number of scholars have explored this topic.

Geologists and advocates in the Northwest such as the Ice Age Floods Institute, formed in 1995 to promote public recognition of these ancient floods, have pressed for the creation of a heritage area that will help visitors interpret the bizarre landscape.

On March 9, 2009, they got their wish. On that date, President Obama signed the “Omnibus Public Land Management Act of 2009” into law (Public Law 111 – 11), which included the designation of the Ice Age Floods National Geologic Trail. No funding was included in the bill, but according to the Institute, “the National Park Service would oversee the geologic trail, which would cost an estimated $8 million to $12 million to create.” A preliminary map had already been made a part of the public record in 2004. So now the work begins - laying out routes, establishing the best viewpoints, designing the signs, and … maybe even building a visitor center. It's a fascinating story. One the public will surely appreciate.

Bretz was the first to unlock the mystery, as chronicled in the fascinating book by John Soennichsen, Bretz's Flood. For Bretz, there were no books to consult; no Google Earth; no websites with helpful information.  He poured over incomplete topographical maps; tested soils; compared the altitudes of various features to calculate the estimated maximum depths of the floodwaters. Even with this enormous effort, he endured the scorn of colleagues who didn’t buy into his theories for decades.

For me, little can compare with my sense of discovery as I passed through the region and since. Rather than having the answers spelled out on an interpretive plaque, I could pursue them myself – questioning, researching, reading, reviewing my photographs again and again, looking for clues, tracing my path on my atlas and aerial maps.  I imagine that Bretz himself, possessed by the task of unlocking the mystery the landscape presented, must have experienced enormous satisfaction in fulfilling his quest. My journey was a minor dalliance in comparison. I am enormously grateful to all those scientists and lovers of geology who have, since Bretz, written the books and papers that can answer questions my trip through the region provoked.

For this study, I owe special thanks to friend Ben, who encouraged me to see as much of his beloved Washington State as possible before I returned “Back East.” The spirit of discovery, pursuit of research questions, the Ice Age Floods, the dam that was once the Eighth Wonder of the World, the Grand Coulee, and the Dry Falls – all of these were included in one 50-mile diversion that was one of the best parts of my tour through the West.

PARTIAL SAMPLING OF RESOURCES:

Grand Coulee Dam:

Grand Coulee Dam. Official Website. U.S. Department of the Interior, Bureau of Reclamation, Pacific Northwest Region. URL http://www.usbr.gov/pn/grandcoulee/index.html accessed September 18, 2010.

Gregory, James, Mark Jenkins, and Sarah Nash Gates, Project Directors. “Grand Coulee Dam: Leaving a Legacy.” The Great Depression in Washington State Project. Multi-media website. University of Washington, Seattle, WA. URL accessed September 18, 2010 http://depts.washington.edu/depress/grand_coulee.shtml

Harden, Blaine. A River Lost: The Life and Death of the Columbia. New York: W.W. Norton & Company, 1996.

State of Washington. Grand Coulee Dam: 8th Wonder of the World. Souvenir pamphlet. Davenport WA: Times Publishing Company, 1947.

“A Walk Through Time.” The Confederated Tribes of the Colville Reservation. Official Website. URL http://www.colvilletribes.com/past.htm accessed 13 October 2010.

Ice Age Floods:

Allen, John Elliott, Marjorie Burns, and Scott Burns. Cataclysms on the Columbia: the Great Missoula Floods. 1986. 2nd Ed. Portland OR: Ooligan Press, Portland State University, 2009.

Associated Press. “Ice age floods trail opens in Washington.” OregonLive.com. Website. Published May 28, 2009. URL accessed 13 October 2010. http://www.oregonlive.com/environment/index.ssf/2009/05/ice_age_floods_trail_opens_in.html

Bjornstad, Bruce. On the Trail of the Ice Age Flood: A geological field guide to the Mid-Columbia Basin. Sandpoint, Idaho: Keokee Co. Publishing, Inc., 2008.

Foster, Tom. Huge Floods. Website. URL http://hugefloods.com/ accessed 13 October 2010. Pasco WA: Tom Foster, 2010.

Jones & Jones Architects and Landscape Architects (Jones, Grant, Ilze Jones, and Johnpaul Jones, Principals). Ice Age Floods: Study of Alternatives and Environmental Assessment Following the Pathways of the Glacial Lake Missoula Floods. Study funded by the National Park Service through its Special Resource Study Program. Seattle WA: Jones & Jones Architects and Landscape Architects, February 2001. URL http://www.nps.gov/iceagefloods/

"The National Geologic Trail." Ice Age Floods Institute. Website. URL https://www.iafi.org/?s=geologic+trail accessed 2 February 2024.

Soennichsen, John. Bretz's Flood: The Remarkable Story of a Rebel Geologist and the World's Greatest Flood. Seattle WA: Sasquatch Books, 2008.

Weis, Paul L. and William L. Newman. The Channeled Scablands of Eastern Washington: The Geologic Story of the Spokane Flood. Washington DC: U.S. Department of the Interior/ Geological Survey (USGS), 2006. Online book. URL http://www.nps.gov/history/history/online_books/geology/publications/inf/72-2/index.htm  accessed December 6, 2010.

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A Culture Lost Beneath the Waters: The Downsville Dam/Pepacton Reservoir

Northern end of Pepacton Reservoir, looking NE.

“(Pepacton)” was the first sign I saw as I drove northward along the Pepacton Reservoir on Route 30, just northeast of Downsville, NY. Interesting, those parentheses. A lost community. There was no evidence of any settlements – just a perimeter road through the forested banks of the Pepacton Reservoir. How many more towns were here once, I wondered?

In upstate New York with a rare free afternoon, I had set out to explore the Downsville Dam – an enormous earthen dam completed in 1954 as part of the Delaware water system. I remember walking with my father along the crest of the dam when I was about 5 years old. Then it had seemed an endless expanse of bare earth stretching from one side of the valley to the other. I recall other sightseers strolling along the crest that Sunday afternoon as if they were on an outing at the Boardwalk.

Dad was always impressed by major events – natural and man-made -- that changed the earth in some way. Large-scale earthworks were a special fascination. I can imagine how the Downsville Dam must have inspired him.

Aerial view of Downsville [NY] Dam. Historic
Postcard.  Delhi, NY: Bob Wyer Photocards, ca. 1960.

The dam is 2,400 feet long, 200 feet high, and 1,800 feet thick at its base. The upstream side is concrete; the downstream side is a long, gently sloping earth embankment. The Reservoir is some 18 miles long, has a shore line of 50 miles, and a surface area of 6,400 acres. It drains a watershed of 370 square miles and holds 150 billion gallons of fresh water. A 26-mile long tunnel transports water eastward from the Pepacton Reservoir to the Rondout Reservoir, thence through the Delaware Aqueduct towards New York City.

The Pepacton was part of the Delaware system first approved in 1931 that included the Rondout, Neversink, and Cannonsville reservoirs. They augmented the earlier Ashokan and Schoharie reservoirs in the Catskills. These new reservoirs were to meet New York City’s water needs at least until 1990.

I traveled to the hamlet of Downsville via Route 30, a scenic route along the East Branch of the Delaware River in Delaware County. I was hoping for a visitor’s center where I could learn more about the dam and its history, not to mention a good viewing point for photographs like they have for the “Big Dams” built during the New Deal. I encountered none.

As part of the New York City water supply system, security is tight around the Pepacton Reservoir. There are no pull outs, no visitor centers. Fishing is allowed in the reservoir, but only by permit. There are only a few places to launch a boat. I saw only one boat on the water that day. Glimpses of the reservoir can be seen through the trees along the perimeter road, but otherwise, the best viewpoint for a photo is taken from a car window as you drive over the bridge at the north end near Margaretville. As for the dam itself, there is certainly no more strolling along the crest. Chain-link fencing and lack of a pull-out discourages any would-be sightseer from stopping for a closer look.

View of valley before inundation by Pepacton Reservoir.
From NYS interpretive exhibit nr. Margaretville, NY.

The story of the Pepacton Reservoir is revealed only in a small installation of several photo boards under a shelter at its northeastern corner. These modest boards provided the basics of the story and some excellent historic photos of the four hamlets that were inundated: Pepacton, Shavertown, Arena, and Union Grove. In all, 974 people were displaced, along with 36 businesses, 8 churches, 5 schools, 4 post offices, and 13 cemeteries, and a number of outlying farms. Subsequent research discovered only one other local history, one video produced in 2007, and one website that considered the building of the Downsville dam and the loss of the communities in the valley. I found numerous articles on the project in the online archives of the New York Times, which were quite satisfying. Perhaps there are more, but I was unable to find them during this search.

In contrast to this paucity, federal dams such as the Grand Coulee, which I visited this summer, are focal points for tourism and ready sources of information. That dam had an excellent interpretive center, which offered written materials, videos, staff, and walking tours not only about the dam engineering, but also the lost Native American culture that lived for generations beside the banks of the Columbia River. The Grand Coulee is remote from major tourist routes, yet the center was filled with visitors, many of whom had driven many miles out of their way to learn about the site.

Given the budget issues facing all levels of government these days, there is little chance that a more thoughtful and comprehensive exploration of the creation of the Delaware/Catskill water system will be installed near the reservoirs anytime soon. And yet, I hope that at some point New York will find the resources to better remember the communities that sacrificed their existence for the sake of the larger good and celebrate the marvels of this great engineering feat.

Student posing outside the school at Arena, NY (demolished 1954)  
From NYS exhibit board nr Margaretville, NY. 

Resources:


“A memorial to the towns that were sacrificed for New York City.” The Hudson Valley and the Catskills. Website. URL: http://bearsystems.com/losttowns/lost.html accessed August 24, 2010. Information on lost towns from the Delaware/Catskill reservoir system: West Hurley, Ashton, Glenford, Brown's Station, Olive Bridge, Brodhead, Shokan, West Shokan, Boiceville, Beerston, Cannonsville, Rock Rift, Rock Royal, Granton, Neversink, Bittersweet, Arena, Pepacton, Shavertown, Union Grove, Eureka, Montela, Lackawack and Gilboa.


“Shavertown – Reservoir of Memories.” Video. 2007. Documentary created by students Cheyenne Tait, Carrianne Fairbairn, and Brittany McAdams along with Mrs. Colleen Heavey and Mrs. Wendy Redden of Andes Central School. Project was made possible in part with a grant from the Catskill Watershed Corporation in partnership with the NYC Dept. of Environmental Protection. URL accessed August 24, 2010 [no longer online as of December 2014].


Jacobson, Alice H. Beneath Pepacton Waters. Andes NY: A.H. Jacobson, c1988; rev. 1994.

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Home Again

Appalachin Mountains

 14 National Parks, 10,793 Miles, 23 States, 36 Days. Not that I'm counting.

I arrived back in my home state of New Jersey on Friday July 29, two days ahead of schedule. I'm not sure of the exact moment when I decided that my trip was over, but suddenly going home was my only goal.

That moment may have been when the air started to grow heavy with the sultry summer murkiness so familiar to Easterners. It may have been while traveling along the comforting green folds of the Appalachian chain. All I know that, instead of musing expectantly about the next destination as I had for the past 5 weeks, I longed to sleep in my own bed at home in New Jersey.

So, instead of staying on the orange route across country that I had highlighted in my atlas, I picked up the blue highlighter. Blue was reserved for deviations, usually short cuts. Concessions. Surrender. In this case, I traced over the Interstate highways that would get me home faster than the original scenic routes I had mapped for my return.

Since my homecoming, I have busied myself with putting my life back in order. No longer confined to the back of the car, the things I brought with me and the things I acquired along the way seemed to multiply and explode throughout the house. Piles of books, clothes for all seasons, gifts for family and friends. Suddenly, mounds of stuff are everywhere. I'm still not quite sure how my little Jetta held all those things so compactly.

One of the first tasks was to take the Jetta to the car wash, where the dull film of road dust accumulated since California was scrubbed away. The car emerged gleaming, except for the little round white Park- to-Park tour sticker I had on the back window, which looks proudly weathered. Gifts are being distributed to their intended recipients. Books and other resource materials are moving to a special shelf for the real work that will come later.

Memories of the trip, however, linger on. The sweet scent of dry sagebrush after the rainstorm near Joshua Tree. The odd sensation of traveling half-blind into the fog on “Going to the Sun Road” in Glacier National Park, with the stone cliff rising straight up from one side of the narrow road and a several hundred-foot drop-off on the other. The amazing turn in the road from an arid section of Washington State into the entrance of Mt. Rainier National Park, where suddenly you're in a verdant rainforest. Getting up before dawn to catch the new day coming to the ancient cliff dwellings at Mesa Verde.

The most striking thing I discovered during this trip was the amazing beauty of each park. Each had spectacular aspects that were unique. And each park was preserved thanks to the heroic efforts of a small number of dedicated individuals who believed that these spaces should be preserved - not for economic benefit, but simply for their remarkable, breathtaking beauty.

What started out as a re-creation of the Park-to-Park highway dedication tour of 1920 and an exploration of the architecture and landscape design of the western national parks turned into something much more. First, I developed a deep appreciation for the sufferings that the first tour members endured on their trip. I found that, in many cases, the even the most direct roads taken in 1920 were impossibly circuitous. Much of the 1920 route consisted of dirt roads. Cars lacked the sophisticated suspension systems we have today. The passengers enjoyed only minimal protection from heat and cold. I marveled at the stamina of the group, especially on the road through the impossibly hot and unending plains that stretch from Casper, Wyoming, toward Yellowstone. Although there are times I felt I was “suffering” on this trip as I zipped along at 70 mph in my comfy, fully air-conditioned car, it was nothing to what they endured. We are the happy beneficiaries of the good roads that were built between and within these special places as a result of their efforts.

Second, I was completely overwhelmed by the monumental and dynamic landscape of the American West. Unlike the complacent, undulating hills I have always known on the East Coast, something is always on the move in the West -- earthquakes, landslides, cloudbursts, volcanos, wildfires -- at any moment, a dramatic natural event of enormous proportions might happen. It's somewhat disconcerting to someone like me, who is used to a more sedentary (or sedementary) life.

During the course of this trip, I took some 4,800 photos. Many of these are just visual notes, meant to trigger a memory, record a thought, or document something I thought interesting. Other, more ambitious photos tried to capture a mood, the delicacy of a wildflower, or the fleeting light of sunrise. I am still not sure how successful those efforts were.  It will take a long, thoughtful look through the images to sort that out.

So, this part of my trip is complete. It was amazing. Thank you to all who shared the journey with me along the way. Thank you, dear reader, for taking the time to follow along vicariously. Now the real work begins. I will keep you posted.


National Parks Visited (June July 2010):

Yellowstone (WY); Glacier (MT); Mt. Rainier (WA); Redwood (CA); Crater Lake (CA); Lassen Volcanic (CA); Yosemite (CA); King's Canyon, formerly Gen. Grant (CA); Sequoia (CA); Joshua Tree (CA); Zion (UT); Grand Canyon (AZ); Mesa Verde (CO); and Rocky Mountain (CO).


Most Useful Reference Books on the trip:

Guide to Scenic Highways and Byways: The 275 Best Drives in the U.S. 3rd Ed. Washington DC:  National Geographic Society, 2007.

Kaiser, Harvey H. The National Park Architecture Sourcebook. New York: Princeton Architectural Press, 2008.

Laine, Don and Barbara. Frommer's National Parks of the American West. 6th Ed. Hoboken NJ: Wiley Publishing, Inc., 2008.

Whiteley, Lee and Jane Whiteley. The Playground Trail: The National Park-to-Park Highway: To and Through the National Parks of the West in 1920. Boulder CO: Lee Whiteley and Jane Whiteley, 2003.

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Berea, KY - Well-Crafted Living

Handcrafted Birdhouses
Appalachian Fireside Gallery, Main St, Berea, KY

Kentucky had been first on my list of explorations for this trip. It was to have been a simple diversion before starting out on the real itinerary, the Park-to-Park Highway Tour Redux. Unfortunately, time and distance constraints did not allow the luxury of leisurely stops on the way out West, so it was rescheduled for the trip home.

On the way East, however, I took the more southern route from Denver along Route 70. I passed quickly through Colorado, then Kansas, then Missouri and, after a day exploring St. Louis, headed toward Kentucky.

Now, I can't explain exactly why Kentucky has lived so long in my imagination. Certainly it was not horse-racing - I'm not big on horses and I discovered that the season was over by July, in any event. Perhaps I had a vision of myself sitting on a cool veranda somewhere, drinking a mint julep. But then I had an idea of what went into one and didn't think I'd like it anyway.

No, the real reason was Kentucky crafts – a passion of mine. The Kentucky “heritage trail” was billed as a series of places around that state that featured the music, folk art, crafts, and cooking of the Appalachin region. I never did find an actual “trail,” but I did find the town of Berea.

The flourishing little town of Berea not only has many talented crafts people, but it also a remarkable history – one that is still being lived today. One of the central reasons for its prosperity is Berea College, the campus of which is located just off the main street.

Fairchild Hall (ca. 1872), Berea College, Berea, KY

The school was founded in 1855 by Kentucky abolitionist John G. Fee to provide a low-cost, high-quality education to students of all races. Not only has Berea College continued its commitment to interracial education and harmony among all people but it has developed a guiding philosophy that emphasizes the importance of service to communities in Appalachia and beyond, stewardship of natural resources, and preservation of regional culture and traditions.

For more than 150 years, the school has provided tuition-free education to its students. The school brochure notes that Berea College is probably the only school in the United States to turn qualified candidates away because they don't have financial need.

All of the some 1,500 students it admits each year work at least 10 hours per week in College jobs, which funds a portion of their college expenses. Among the jobs students hold are staffing the Boone Tavern Hotel and Restaurant, an historic hotel owned by the College in downtown Berea, producing regional crafts for sale in several student craft outlets such as the Log House, and myriad other jobs within the school's 100 academic departments and administration. The rest of the funds come from contributions, grants, and other funding sources.

The students I met admitted that the academics were challenging, but that they really loved being there. A more polite and considerate group of young people would be hard to find. The town is “dry,” meaning no liquor is sold or served anywhere – a fact that some hotel guests find incomprehensible at first, but perhaps contributes to good performance at school. Given the poverty of the region, it was inspiring to see how one school could not only live up to its mission, but thrive – even today – without charging its students a penny for a quality education.

Old Artisan Village, Berea, KY

And yes, I did eventually find my crafts in Berea. The student crafts store downtown offered wonderful woven goods, furniture, and pottery – all favorites. And in the “Old Town Artisan Village” about a mile away, there are many other types of regional crafts represented among the several stores. Great finds. Some of the artisans were former students of the college who had stayed on to practice their craft in this supportive environment.

I left Berea much poorer in terms of my wallet, but much richer for having shared in the story of this remarkable community.


For more information about the region, see:

Children of the Mountains Struggle to Survive, Diane Sawyer Reports on Children in Central Appalachia, by Keturah Gray (Feb. 13, 2009)  URL: http://abcnews.go.com/2020/story?id=6865077

Berea College Website   http://www.berea.edu/  

Berea - Where Arts Live. Website of the Berea Tourism Center, 201 N Broadway, Berea, Kentucky 40403. URL http://www.berea.com/

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Storms in the Rockies

There is nothing half-hearted about weather in the West. Extremes are the order of the day.

Last week, I headed east on Colorado's Route 160 after my early morning exploration of Mesa Verde National Park, thankful that I was finally leaving the oven that was the “Four Corners,” where Utah, Colorado, Arizona, and New Mexico meet. The mountains on the horizion promised cooler weather at last.

Durango was the first stop – a well-preserved, chic, and busy town in southern Colorado. For the first time in days, temperatures were tolerable. I enjoyed walking around the main street and driving through some of the historic residential neighborhoods, then returned to the road to continue on to Pagosa Springs, as the route rose into the Southern Rockies. I crossed the Continental Divide via the spectacular Wolf Creek Pass in the San Juan National Forest, and turned southeast towards Alamosa.

Ominous clouds started to gather over the peaks as I approached La Veta Pass, which takes the road over the eastern Rocky Mountain mountains into Walsenberg and down to I-25. At first they were a pleasant diversion. The land was so flat that it was easy to see where the rain was already falling. The storms looked pretty serious but, at least so far, it looked like my route was going to successfully skirt the worst of it.

 
However, as I started the climb into the pass, the first drops appeared on the windshield. Then the rain became steady, but no one slowed down very much. When the hills disappeared into a gray torrent, cars started to slow, although the 18-wheelers continued to roar past my car. I finally pulled over to the side and turned on my hazards when my wipers, going at full tilt, made absolutely no impact on the amount of water on the windshield – I couldn't see a thing.

I waited. And waited. No let-up. I watched rivulets turn into small rivers along the dirt pull-out. I worried about being caught in a flash flood, something news reports always warn about in this region, but the water seemed to be successfully disappearing somewhere behind my car. When I could at least see one hill in front of me, I set out again but pulled over around the next curve with several other out- of-state cars unused to the force of this kind of storm.

This happened several times through the pass – the world would disappear into a grey shroud, the biggest drops of unrelenting rain I have ever seen would pelt down upon my car. I was happy they weren't hailstones. Huge washes of water crossed the road and carved out a streambed at the edges of the dirt pull-out where several of us had stopped. Finally, after about an hour of starts and stops, my fellow travelers and I felt confident that we could continue on and left the safety of the side of the road.

My friend Joey, a childhood friend and Colorado resident who joined me for the final leg of my P2P tour, insisted that this was normal for the Rockies. And, sure enough, the mornings dawned with sparkling blue skies; wispy clouds appeared by midday; and by afternoon towering thunderheads dumped torrents of rain somewhere or other, driving people off the roads and into shelter.

Impressive. Scary. I'm not sure I could stand the constant excitement of life here in the Front Range.

Heatwave

Keys View Promontory, Joshua Tree National Park, CA

It has been some two weeks since I left the cool of the northern California coastal redwoods. And, although I complained about how tired I was of the residues of volcanic activity, at least my tour there kept me on the tops of mountains, where snow still occasionally lined the roadway at depths of 10 ft. or more.

As I descended down through California's Central Valley, the temperature jumped to amazing heights. 104 degrees in Redding, at the northern end of the Valley, was the start of it. Leaving the glare of I-5, I detoured through the Napa Valley on my way to Martinez in the Bay area, where a family gathering was planned. This provided some relief from the heat, but not the traffic. Napa is now a major destination for city dwellers who don't really want to leave the city behind on their vacations. It reminded me of the posh Hamptons on the South Fork of Long Island.

After spending two wonderful days getting reacquainted with the West Coast wing of my family, Betsy, Dan and I left for Yosemite National Park, King's Canyon, and Sequoia National Parks, in the Sierra Nevada mountains. (These will get their own little stories when I get my thoughts together.)

When we left Sequoia via the Three Rivers exit on the south, we had no idea what lay in store for us. By this time, the Central Valley near Fresno had been experiencing record heat and very poor air quality – a fact noted by the park rangers in Sequoia.

To reach our next destination, Joshua Tree National Park, our route skirted the south end of the Sierra Nevada range and into the Mohave Desert, on the east side of the Sierras, where temperatures climbed to over 110 degrees. Nothing appeared to be moving on the hundreds of square miles of brush, red dirt, and rocks, except for the traffic.

Red Rock Canyon State Park, near the Mojave Desert, California

We turned east at Victorville, silly us, and continued deeper into the desert. 29 Palms is an artsy outpost at the north entrance to Joshua Tree, where we spent the night vowing to get an early start in the morning.

Dawn comes to Twenty Palms, California

It was already in the 80s by the morning when we started out, then it quickly rose to the 90s. We saw a variety of reptiles, desert rodents, and birds – along with Joshua Trees, of course. We ended with a brief respite at a Keys View promentory, where we peered down into the Coachella valley near Palm Springs, along which runs the San Andreas fault. The valley was murky with days of unbroken heat and pollution.

View of San Bernadino Mountains near Palm Springs, California, from Keys Point.

Los Angeles was no different – and millions of people were leaving town for parts north. Las Vegas promised no relief – it was in the high nineties there as well. I continued north to Zion and Grand Canyon National Park, where I hoped the higher elevation would save me. I was wrong. The winner of the high temperatures for the week was in Kanab, Utah, which reportedly reached 114 degrees the day I booked a room there.

Intense heat, coupled with hundreds of miles of wide open wilderness, is nervewracking for this gentle Easterner. First, heat and I are not on the best of terms. I think it is my Irish blood, yearning for fisherman's knit sweaters and a cool mist. This part of the trip would have been better attempted in the winter, in retrospect.

On the road to Kanab, UT. Temperature 113 deg. F.

Second, although my new Jetta wagon has been a stellar perfomer, I worry about having a flat tire, engine trouble, or some other event that will strand me in the heat, along the side of the road. This fear is compounded by the fact that I can go for a hundred miles without a cell phone signal. I brought along a CB radio for emergencies, but that requires a functioning car battery – something that I am not convinced will work when I need it.

Finally, it makes it hard for me to enjoy anything in this beautiful landscape, if it means that I have to leave my air-conditioned car. Sightseeing? Forget it. Shopping at some out of the way trading post? Ridiculous. All I really want to do is get as close as possible to the boundaries of the next amazing park I am going to visit, check in to an air-conditioned hotel with WiFi and a cell phone signal by 2 in the afternoon, and hide out in the cool until 5 the next morning, when I can streak into the park before those pesky [other] tourists get up.

How exhausting!