Recovery Act Funding Restores Trails, Protects Wilderness Resources

Project fact sheet 
News release - October 5, 2009

The BLM Coeur d’Alene Field Office has used American Recovery and Reinvestment Act (ARRA) funding to rehabilitate a portion of the Twin Crags Trail in the Crystal Lake Wilderness Study Area (WSA) and part of another trail that leads to Little Lost Lake in the Grandmother Mountain WSA.

The BLM management plan for the Crystal Lake WSA designates the Twin Crags Trail as a single-track route, open to motorcycles and snowmobiles.  Unauthorized users had widened the trail, cutting trees and other vegetation and even excavating, cutting and filling a second track so the trail would be passable for ATVs.

A BLM work crew placed width-limiting barriers and installed signage along the route to clearly specify that it is closed to off-highway vehicles (OHVs). The trail remains passable for hikers, snowmobilers, motorcyclists, mountain bikers and equestrians.

“We’ve been concerned about the effects of unauthorized use of the Twin Crags Trail for a while,” said BLM Coeur d’Alene District Manager Gary Cooper, “so, we’re pleased to take the opportunity Recovery Act funding presents to restore this trail segment to its authorized condition.”

The Crystal Creek WSA was identified as having wilderness characteristics in the 1980 Idaho Wilderness Inventory.  The BLM is required to manage a WSA to prevent impairment of its wilderness characteristics.  Erosion and other deterioration caused by unauthorized trail use threatened wilderness values in the area around the Twin Crags Trail.  Stabilizing lands along the trail segment helps preserve resources recognized in the wilderness inventory. Signs will improve public awareness and increase visitor compliance with travel restrictions. 

The BLM cooperated closely with the owner of private land adjacent to the WSA through which another portion of the trail runs. The landowner also installed access controls in Reeds Gulch. The combined efforts effectively block ATV passage onto the trail from both primary access points.

Crystal Lake and Grandmother Mountain are two areas of a total of about 1.3 million acres of public lands in Idaho which have been identified as having wilderness characteristics.

Rehabilitation work on a steep stretch of the Little Lost Lake Trail in the Grandmother Mountain (Widow Mountain) WSA was also completed with ARRA funding.  

As shown in the slides at left, runoff flowing down the trail was washing sediment onto the Forest Service road that leads to the trailhead and into the nearby Little North Fork of the Clearwater River, ultimately altering habitat for the threatened bull trout and the waterway's "wild" character.  The BLM is responsible for managing to protect both wilderness values.

BLM seasonal workers and volunteers built drainage features at key points along a half-mile of the trail.  A second crew installed information kiosks at the Crater Lake and Crater Peak campsites in the southern part of the WSA, improving public access to the Widow Mountain backcountry.

The Grandmother Mountain WSA is described in the 1991 Idaho Wilderness Study Report.  Also known as Widow Moutain, the area has lakes and streams for fishing, and numerous places to gather berries, hunt, and view wildlife.  Wilderness Study Areas are units of the BLM's National Landscape Conservation System, whose 27 million acres encompass some of the West's most significant ecological, scientific and cultural resources. 

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act gave the Department of the Interior more than $3 billion.  Of that amount, $305 million was allocated to the BLM nationally.

> MORE Recovery Act projects in the Coeur d'Alene District
> The Recovery Act on Public Lands in Idaho