Benches on Siphon Draw Trail

[brusso99]

Hello,

My first post. Really enjoying the hiking. Made it up to the flatiron with my wife recently and I was kind of miffed by the new bus stop style benches placed in the wilderness by scouts apparently. They totally kill the landscape since they are bright aluminum, I suspect they will be just magnets for graffiti. I wanted to get others take on them, and frankly see if others agree they should be removed. If so i would like to start getting people to contact the park and let them know they don't belong in there. whats next a starbucks on the flatiron?

Thanks
Brett

[PatrickL]

Traitor! Traitor! Delete your HAZ account immediately! Run away and never look back!

looks comfy

[outdoor_lover]

@CannondaleKid "We"? Did Traci go with you? Good for you guys. Personally I really don't give a pumpkin about the benches one way or the other. Maybe because I have yet to see them? I will be seeing them Thursday though.....

[CannondaleKid]

"We"?

Yup, Tracey and Gabriele (SUN_HIKER) joined me on this one. My triplog is here:
http://hikearizona.com/x.php?x=69927

[Trishness]

[quote="CannondaleKid"]We just got back from doing the Superstition Ridgeline today and I've got to say I absolutely LOVED the first bench we came to on the way down Siphon Draw.

2012-01-08Ridgeline_88.jpg

How dare you lounge on the bench on Siphon Draw!!!! LOL Love the pic. That's MY bench!

[brusso99]

All the benches are GONE!!! Good riddance!

[BEEBEE]

I am sure the kid who was working on his Eagle project and thought he was doing a good thing for the community agrees with you......

[hikeaz]

"Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, concerned citizens can change the world (or even a state park). Indeed it is the only thing that ever has."

— Margaret Mead

[Tough_Boots]

@BEEBEE

if the best an Eagle Scout can do is build some benches, he better get used to a little disappointment

[SuperstitionGuy]

@BEEBEE
Agrees with who?

[BEEBEE]

@BEEBEE

if the best an Eagle Scout can do is build some benches, he better get used to a little disappointment

Read about what goes into the planning and significance of the eagle project to a young man in the scouts and you might not be so quick to poke fun at it. It was not something done "willy nilly" it would have required lots of panning and approval before he would have even been able to do this. Your response to my statement clearly shows your ignorance on the subject.

[Tough_Boots]

it would have required lots of panning and approval before he would have even been able to do this.

apparently not enough planning and approval let alone foresight...

I would hope that an eagle scout has thick enough skin and enough salt to not get all butt hurt because someone made fun of the benches he made and stuck out in the cut where they don't belong.

Was it actually even Eagle Scouts that built them or are we just being jerks in a hypothetical situation?

[BEEBEE]

The average age of someone who attains the rank of Eagle Scout is 17 which means if this was an Eagle project as other posts have indicated would make the persons who did this less than 17 years old.

Do some research into an Eagle project see what it takes there are things in parks all over this state that have been done by boy scouts that I am willing to bet every person who uses HAZ has benefited from.

[Tough_Boots]

that still doesn't justify the benches...

[BEEBEE]

It also does not justify an adult picking on a kid.....If this was someones Eagle Project

[Tough_Boots]

okay then: sorry to the possibly fictitious kid who is probably not reading this anyways. Apparently since you are young, you're allowed to act out all sorts of bad ideas that negatively impact others' enjoyment of the outdoors.

[SuperstitionGuy]

I am confused.
Were the bench(s) in the Wilderness or not? If so I do not believe the USFS or BSA would have allowed them.
Were any of them installed by Boy Scouts and specifically as an Eagle Project?

I seriously doubt that the average age of a boy in this part of Arizona was 17 at the time that he did his Eagle Project. Yes, Eagle Projects are done near the end of a Boys efforts to become an Eagle but my experience sitting Eagle Boards in the Mesa and Tempe Scout Districts tells me otherwise.

[Tough_Boots]

early on in the thread, someone who is not a regular contributor claimed they were put there by scouts and that all of them are dedicated to someone. "Dedicated to someone" in my mind makes me assume that money was donated to the scouts for these benches. I don't know whether its true or not. I don't remember whether any of them were beyond the wilderness boundaries or not but I know that the state park does not exactly respect those boundaries-- one of the Tonto rangers told me that they catch the state park folks in motorized vehicles beyond the boundaries quite frequently. They definitely, though, were in national forest and not in the state park boundaries.

[BobP]

It was a scout project in memory of an 8,10 year old and a two others that died http://kimandmarcus.blogspot.com/2011/1 ... bench.html
http://alltrails.com/tracks/trail-of-trust

[Alston_Neal]

@rlrjamy
Well that puts a whole other perspective on this thread.

[Tough_Boots]

well, I'm happy to see that they were more appropriately moved into the state park. Seems odd to me that benches and markers are seen by some as appropriate in the national forest but the spreading of ashes is actually illegal. My sister died at a young age so I understand the need to make remembrances but I'm not going to impose my private matters of the heart onto others.