The Adirondack Council has issued areportthat finds the steepness of some hiking trails in the Adirondack High Peaks is threatening their sustainability and should be rerouted as more and more hikers use the paths.
Many of the hiking trails in the Adirondacks were created shortly after the Civil War and run straight up the mountain with no sustained grades. Many of the most popular High Peaks trails have not changed and overuse is highlighting the resultant erosion and deterioration.
Adirondack Council Conservation Associate Charlotte Staats describes some of the damage they found from natural and human erosion caused by unnatural steepness.
“What you’ll see as you’re hiking along trails that are heavily used are often they’ll be gullied out. There’ll also be exposed roots and rocks that may not have been there originally when the hiking trail was put in but as soil erodes away it exposes those roots and rocks and creates tripping hazards essentially," says Staats. "And then you can also see sections of trail that are very wide and that’s the result of people wanting to, they see some sort of obstacle or challenge and they want to avoid that so they go off to the side of the trail. And ultimately that widens the trail and spreads the impact.”
The study Staats conducted found that due to soil composition and other factors serious erosion is occurring in the Adirondacks on trails with an 8 percent or greater slope. The trails on the two mountains that were studied, St. Regis and Ampersand, exceed a 10 percent slope. Staats also says a 2019 GIS analysis that found 167 miles of High Peaks’ trails exceed an 8 percent slope, a grade that is conducive to erosive damage.
“When the slope is too steep for a hiking trail, water just continues to run down the trail itself instead of shedding off of it and that will speed up the erosion process. And when they’re steeper it’s more likely that the soil will be easily kicked away as people are hiking. And that’s really prevalent in the Adirondacks," Staats explains. "Because when the trails were built people weren’t thinking about how steep the trails should be to make sure that they were going to last a long time. They were just concerned with getting from point A to point B, which is usually the summit of the mountain, as fast as possible.”
Protect the Adirondacks has also studied the steep slope and subsequent degradation of Adirondack trails. Executive Director Peter Bauer says some of the steepest trails have become streams, promoting more erosion. He is enthusiastic though about a model trail being built that illustrates sustainable trail construction methods.
“One of the most exciting things going on in the High Peaks now is a new sustainable trail, a showcase trail, that’s being built up Mt. Van Hoevenberg. And this new trail follows the grade of the mountain. It’s a longer trail but it’s a very gradual trail. It’s a you know 4, 5, 3 percent grade. Makes it much easier for the hiking public to walk on,' says Bauer. "These trails are very labor intensive to build. But we hope that they are really a model for the future and we can use them in many places in the High Peaks.”
