Access to Cascade Pass blocked this summer?
View from Sahale Arm, North Cascades National Park. The U.S. Forest Service and Skagit County are in a dispute over who should fix the road that provides access to this popular hiking area. Photo by Dave Schiefelbein.
Will you be able to hike to Cascade Pass and Sahale Arm this summer? It's not a sure thing.
Officials from the Mount Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest and Skagit County are in a dispute over who will fund and repair a damaged bridge on the Cascade River Road. In last December's storm, landslides crashed into the Hard Creek Bridge, located at milepost 12.7. The road provides access to Cascade Pass, one of the most popular and spectactular hikes in the North Cascades.
Early this year, the county was denied a FEMA grant for repairs of the bridge, said Jeff Miller, assistant public works director for the county. As a result, Miller told me “the road will probably not open this summer.” Miller said that without federal funds, the county could not afford to spend the estimated $.5 to $1 million required for a new bridge, especially considering the county’s entire roads budget is just $4 million. He did think it was possible a temporary bridge could be constructed by late summer, but without funding nothing was certain.
Skagit county and the Forest Service have exchanged letters (read them here and here) about the county’s attempts to abandon its responsibility for maintaining the Cascade River Road. The Forest Service has countered that the county is solely responsible, since the road was first created in the late 1800s and predates even the existence of the Forest Service. The road was considered for a cross-Cascades highway in the mid-20th century until plans were abandoned.
District Ranger Jon Vanderheyden told me that the Mount Baker District has offered to work with the county to secure an Emergency Funds For Federal Owned Roads (ERFO) grant, but didn’t receive a response from the county. “FEMA was really the wrong way to go,” said Vanderheyden. He noted that the county and Forest Service previously worked together to repair a similar bridge washout on Sibley Creek about 10 years ago.
If you’d like to contact the Skagit County Board of Commissioners to urge them to work out an arrangement with the Forest Service to re-open the Cascade River Road, e-mail them here.
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