A segment of the Fins ‘N Things Jeep Safari Trail that was closed at the end of 2008 will be reopened, following a unanimous vote by the Grand County Council this week.
The half-mile segment, on property owned by the state School and Institutional Trust Lands Administration, was “inadvertently” excluded from the travel plan portion of the Bureau of Land Management’s new resource management plan adopted in late 2008, according to county council member Chris Baird.
Baird acknowledged that reopening the route “comes with several challenges.” Sand Flats Director Andrea Brand expressed reluctance about reopening the route during a discussion with council members on Tuesday.
The rationale for the council reversing its previous decision was that “all parties” working on the RMP had agreed that no historic Moab Jeep Safari routes would be closed, said Bill Hughes, president of Red Rock Four Wheelers, which sponsors the Jeep Safari.
By unanimous vote, council members supported that agreement and concurred with remarks made by Hughes.
According to Hughes, Dave Vaughn of the Grand County Road Department, Jerry McNeely, who represented the council during RMP preparation, and the BLM recreation director “have all concurred that the closure... was inadvertent and counter to the agreement.” Baird confirmed Hughes’ description of the agreement.
Red Rock Four Wheelers offered to perform the labor needed to reopen the trail. SITLA has not only agreed to allow the reopening, but has offered to pay for the materials needed to do so, Baird said.
“I can totally understand how a mistake like this could come up,” Hughes said. The Red Rock Four Wheelers would like to see the section reopened because it connects with another segment on the other side of the Sand Flats Road, Hughes said.
Brand said reopening the road segment would be “a bitter pill to swallow.”
“It was one of the best closures that we made up there for protecting the land, she said. She said that Sand Flats had “zero complaints” about the closure from the estimated 30,000 motorized users last year.
Much thought and research went into the closure, Brand said, as she addressed the challenges summarized by Baird. Those challenges include a need for fencing or other barricades, and “internal route maintenance” to protect several user-made pull-outs.
Another drawback is that a recently published Sand Flats map would be inaccurate, Baird said.
But the offer of free labor and materials carried the day. Council member Audrey Graham, who represents the council on the Sand Flats Stewardship Committee, said she hopes the move could portend a solution to problems on other parts of the Sand Flats Recreation Area.
Baird’s motion to reopen the Fins ‘N Things segmet stipulates that “internal route maintenance must be completed before the segment is opened to the public.”
