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Hit the Road Jack: Initiative Helps Maintain and Reclaim

By KFBB News Team

Story Created: Aug 25, 2010 at 5:28 PM MST

Story Updated: Aug 25, 2010 at 9:28 PM MST

With National Forest Service road systems equaling eight times the length of our interstate road system, a national restoration project is underway.

News Channel 5's Kacey Drescher got a chance to check out the initiative's progress closer to home and got to see first-hand the condition of underused roads at Lump Gulch, near Park Lake

With over 380,000 miles of forest service roads in the U.S. the Forest Service could only afford to maintain about 80,000 miles of that last year

"…And we don't need that many" says Wildlands CPR Executive Director, Bethanie Walder

And 33,000 of those miles are right here in Montana and many of those roads are closed, underused and there hasn't been funding available to maintain them.

"The Forest Service has been interested in getting this kind of work done for many years but the money just hasn't been available,” says Pacific Rivers Council Director of Science and Conservation Chris Fissel.

Well know, the funding is available. The Legacy Roads and Trails Remediation Initiative has given forest services in Montana approximately $16.4 million dollars since 2008 and that gives them the opportunity to reclaim roads they don't need, decommission and address the ecological burden of their massive road systems.

"Particularly when they’re not actively maintained, these roads concentrate flow, interrupt sub-surface flow, they turn it into surface flow that runs down the roads surface, mobilizes lots of dirt and pushes that right into the streams. The main, primary benefit of these kinds of projects is reducing the amount of silt and dirt that gets into the water ways,” adds Fissel.

By removing sediment and improving drinking water, removing culverts allows a decrease in habitat loss and jobs are created in our own backyard.

"It's nice to be home, reclaiming roads is making it look as natural as you can make it look. You got to have a vision of what it might have looked like 100 years ago and what it's going to look like 100 years from now, you got to have an eye for beauty," says Equipment Operator Karry Cross of D.S. Jr. Trucking.

Walder says "if we can get to a point where reclaiming the ones we don't need and fixing the ones we do, then we'll have a system that actually we can afford to maintain in perpetuity, that's going to put us in a much better position.

Since 2008 Montana has reclaimed 458 miles of Forest Service road and overall the Legacy Roads and Trails Remediation Initiative has improved over 117 miles of road right here in the Treasure State.

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