xsproutx wrote:I'm extremely frustrated with the lack of access to the northern trailhead as it would be trivial to repair the road to there; it *feels* like something where someone is going, "Great, if we just move the closure slightly east, I don't have to maintain that trailhead anymore either..."
I'm not an engineer however throughout my career I've worked on both road projects and been involved with post-fire closures on national forests so my guess is that you're right, there's a good chance that ADOT and the Tonto had a discussion about keeping the road closed where it is to limit vehicle access to Forest Road 212 however probably not only for the reason listed.When a fire like this hits, the Forest Service assembles something called a Burned Area Emergency Response (BAER) team that does an assessment of the burned area to determine if the post-fire changes to the landscape have created new, or imminent threats to life and property as well as creating plans to protect watersheds in the aftermath of the fire. A typical team consists of engineers, hydrologists, soil scientists, botanists, geologists, archeologists, recreation and trails specialists plus others disciplines as needed. In addition to identifying areas that need immediate stabilization, they also assess the likelihood of debris flows caused by post-fire rain events. What I remember of FR 212 is that it cuts through lots of decomposed granite or otherwise highly erosive soil so it's possible that the road was identified as being at high risk for debris flow during post fire rains and therefore it should be closed until the risk passes. When I worked in So Cal, I was told that after the 2003 St Sophia Camp tragedy, the Forest Service became a lot more risk averse when it comes to ending closures of this type.
However, it may be as simple as the fact that there was already a gate there because that also does happen, particularly in situations like this where the road in question (FR 212) is a maintenance level 2 road, which means that it's maintained for access by high clearance vehicles with no regard given to passenger cars or user comfort and convenience. So I don't know that the person in charge of engineering on the forest necessarily said oh good I don't have to maintain that access but rather, I'm not going to spend part of my already limited budget to restore a level 2 road knowing it will all be undone after the next severe storm...
All this said, I don't think it means it's a permanent closure yet, at least in this area. It wouldn't surprise me if the Fish Creek hill is never rebuilt because any cost benefit analysis would show that it doesn't really make sense to spend the amount of money it would take to engineer that road to modern standards given that its primary use is recreation and tourism. But the east side is a different story. More than once in my time working for the Forest Circus I saw a group of volunteers identify a problem and propose a solution that gets adopted. In this case, I think a if few hikers approached groups that are doing motorized recreation volunteer work for the Tonto to talk about a project to move the gate down the road a bit and how to get the Forest to support it. After that, the real challenge is getting ADOT on board with the idea because it's ultimately their road and their decision but if there's public support and the Tonto is behind it, they might be open to it.
Of course, this is all speculation on the decision process and the prospects of making this happen. I don't have any direct knowledge of how they decided on this particular closure boundary so there may be other considerations in keeping it closed there but maybe ADOT will be happy that they're being approached with a feasible idea that won't require millions of dollars and years of study so maybe there's no chance of it happening.
As far as the road on Fish Creek Hill, I know it's not a popular idea, but as lifelong hiker and backpacker, I think the road should remain closed and the portion from the top of the hill to somewhere near the ADOT yard be transferred to the Forest Service and closed as a road. As part of the transfer, ADOT would grant RTP money to the Forest to develop a nice trail down and develop a walk-in/bike-in campground near in the area just east of the bridge...
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