{"id":24830,"date":"2024-11-08T15:55:16","date_gmt":"2024-11-08T22:55:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/first-e-bike-trail-in-san-juan-national-forest-opens\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T05:02:34","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T05:02:34","slug":"first-e-bike-trail-in-san-juan-national-forest-opens","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/first-e-bike-trail-in-san-juan-national-forest-opens\/","title":{"rendered":"First e-bike trail in San Juan National Forest opens"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p><figure class=\"wp-block-image naviga-inline-image\"><img decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/imengine.public.prod.dur.navigacloud.com\/?uuid=7b0a05ac-981f-59e7-8451-a53d72562989&amp;function=cover&amp;type=preview&amp;source=false&amp;width=2000\" width=\"727\" height=\"339\" alt=\"The 6.2-mile Cutthroat Trail, named after the Colorado River Cutthroat Trout, parallels Hermosa Park Road and connects Cascade Divide Road (Forest Service Road 579) and the Upper Hermosa Trailhead. (Screenshot)\" class=\"naviga-image\" loading=\"lazy\"><figcaption><span class=\"caption\">The 6.2-mile Cutthroat Trail, named after the Colorado River Cutthroat Trout, parallels Hermosa Park Road and connects Cascade Divide Road (Forest Service Road 579) and the Upper Hermosa Trailhead. (Screenshot)<\/span><span class=\"credit\">cca<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p><p>The first trail built for nonmotorized vehicles specifically for pedal-assist e-bikes in the San Juan National Forest is open \u2013 although winter storms have left it inaccessibly covered in snow.<\/p>\n<p>The 6.2-mile Cutthroat Trail, named after the Colorado River Cutthroat Trout, parallels Hermosa Park Road and connects Cascade Divide Road (Forest Service Road 579) and the Upper Hermosa Trailhead.<\/p>\n<p>In addition to Class 1 pedal assist e-bikes, the trail is open to hikers, horseback riders and mountain bikers.<\/p>\n<div class=\"naviga-pdf-embed\"><iframe class=\"article-pdf\" src=\"https:\/\/dur-prod-public-pdfs.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com\/a0TH14zUGzftXEAQrKTemRaFhnA.pdf\" style=\"width:100%;height:500px;border:1px solid #ddd\" loading=\"lazy\">\n<p><a href=\"https:\/\/dur-prod-public-pdfs.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com\/a0TH14zUGzftXEAQrKTemRaFhnA.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Cutthroat Trail Map.pdf (Download PDF)<\/a><\/p>\n<p><\/p><\/iframe>\n<p class=\"naviga-pdf-link\"><a href=\"https:\/\/dur-prod-public-pdfs.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com\/a0TH14zUGzftXEAQrKTemRaFhnA.pdf\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">Cutthroat Trail Map.pdf<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<p>When e-bikes first hit the market, most land management agencies classified them as motorized vehicles, said Columbine Ranger District Trails Manager Jordan Burningham, because of the uncertainty of the impact they would have on trails.<\/p>\n<p>But a social trail in the area told land managers that there was a desire to connect these two locations by something other than Hermosa Park Road.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cIf you\u2019re on that road and you\u2019re on a bike, you\u2019re traveling much more slowly, you\u2019re a smaller user,\u201d Burningham said. \u201cThe safety concern is pretty different than someone who\u2019s maybe on a motorcycle.\u201d<\/p>\n\n<p>The environmental assessment of the Cutthroat Trail took e-bikes into account, and the new byway may appear slightly burlier than a standard single-track mountain bike trail.<\/p>\n<p>Lorena Williams, spokeswoman for the SJNF, said the project had the backing of numerous community partners, including Purgatory Resort, National Forest Foundation, Columbine District trail crew, Cottonwood Consulting, Southwest Conservation Corps, Medved Global General Contracting and Durango Trails. Planning began as early as 2017.<\/p>\n<p>It also ties in to a variety of other projects happening in the Hermosa Creek Special Management Area. The trail crosses Sig and Relay creeks at the sites of two newly <a href=\"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/articles\/part-of-hermosa-park-road-near-purgatory-closes-through-sept-13\/\" id=\"link-6081952b03470f2b6b4f4346b4836055\" target=\"_blank\">installed culverts<\/a>, which went in this summer as part of an effort to expand habitat for the native trout.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cUsing the same culvert was not only less expensive, because we didn\u2019t have to create a bridge or an additional culvert for the trail on its own \u2026 it required less work on the ground and it benefits the aquatic organisms,\u201d Williams said.<\/p>\n<p>The new trail is a \u201chuge win\u201d for conservation in a popular recreation area, Williams said.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe\u2019re proud of this as a forest, and we\u2019re really thrilled that our partners showed up for this pretty big undertaking,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n<p><em id=\"emphasis-0aa290de20151b099dc6c719f62d3651\"><a href=\"mailto:rschafir@durangoherald.com\">rschafir@durangoherald.com<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>6.2-mile Cutthroat route runs parallel to Hermosa Park Road<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":24831,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[529,28,977,976,199],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-24830","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-conservation","tag-headlines","tag-mountain-biking","tag-outdoor-recreation","tag-san-juan-national-forest"],"acf":[],"author_name":"dh_admin","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24830","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24830"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24830\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":78692,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24830\/revisions\/78692"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/24831"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24830"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24830"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24830"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dh.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=24830"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}