White River National Forest officials are hoping for better behavior by visitors this weekend than was the case last weekend.
The forest, in Colorado’s central mountains, saw not just a high number of visitors last weekend, but a lot of unwelcome activities. These include multiple unattended campfires even as fire restrictions are in place, and people cutting chains on seasonal Forest Service gates or driving around them, which can disturb wildlife or damage roads.
Some roads that were open but muddy also suffered serious damage.
Perhaps most notably, four people were base-jumping from cliffs above Hanging Lake in Glenwood Canyon last weekend, with one of them ending up in a hospital Sunday.
The trail to Hanging Lake is closed as a COVID-19 response, and off-trail travel in the Hanging Lake area always is prohibited.
“We never want to see people breaking rules and engaging in high-risk behavior, but it’s especially worrisome given the current situation,” White River National Forest Supervisor Scott Fitzwilliams said in a news release. “We don’t want to pull emergency officials away from focusing on the pandemic.”
An investigation into the base-jumping incident continues.
“We’re hoping we don’t see quite the same amount of violations and bad behavior as we saw last week,” said David Boyd, spokesman for the White River National Forest.
He said more people are out in the forest now than is typically the case, which may have been a factor in the rise in problems.
One result is more people coming across seasonally locked gates, with some of them not heeding the closures.
Boyd said just how widespread the recent problems were became apparent during a conference call the following Monday morning.
“Every ranger was talking about the number of violations and the amount of irresponsible behavior. It was pretty noticeable,” he said.
Kim Phillips, spokeswoman for the Grand Mesa, Uncompahgre and Gunnison National Forests, said the GMUG hasn’t seen an uptick in violations like the White River has.
She said it may be that the White River is getting more visitors because of its closer proximity to the Front Range.
Pandemic-related fire restrictions remain in place regionally on national forests, including a ban on campfires.
Developed recreation sites such as campgrounds and day-use areas also remain closed because of COVID-19, although dispersed camping continues to be allowed, along with hiking and river uses.
The pandemic-related restrictions and closures are in place through the end of May.
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May 16, 2020 at 01:15PM
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Forest officials look for better visitor behavior | Western Colorado - The Grand Junction Daily Sentinel
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