Comments on: Are We There Yet? http://www.collide-a-scape.com/2009/03/05/are-we-there-yet/ where nature and culture meet Fri, 10 Feb 2012 07:15:28 +0000 hourly 1 http://wordpress.org/?v=3.3.1 By: Hank Roberts http://www.collide-a-scape.com/2009/03/05/are-we-there-yet/comment-page-1/#comment-97 Hank Roberts Sun, 08 Mar 2009 17:02:20 +0000 http://www.collide-a-scape.com/?p=246#comment-97 One good reason for reviving the CCC -- for making trails in back country, people with hand tools do better work for longterm use. I learned this from rangers in the Cascades in Washington, when planning a 2-week solo hike, back in the 1970s.  The maps available showed all the trails ever built --- and the rangers carefully marked for me the ones built by the CCC with picks and shovels, saying those were stable and could be trusted to actually be there.  They flagged trails shown on the map that had been build later, using dynamite, saying the dynamite saved a lot of time and money making the trails, but fractured the rock to such a depth that after a while big stretches had crumbled away completely. One good reason for reviving the CCC — for making trails in back country, people with hand tools do better work for longterm use.

I learned this from rangers in the Cascades in Washington, when planning a 2-week solo hike, back in the 1970s.  The maps available showed all the trails ever built — and the rangers carefully marked for me the ones built by the CCC with picks and shovels, saying those were stable and could be trusted to actually be there. 

They flagged trails shown on the map that had been build later, using dynamite, saying the dynamite saved a lot of time and money making the trails, but fractured the rock to such a depth that after a while big stretches had crumbled away completely.

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