Letter: City Parks' Intemann Trail reroute blocks waterfall access

Letter: City Parks' Intemann Trail reroute blocks waterfall access

This is the intermittent waterfall that formerly could be accessed from a roughly one-third-mile link off the Intemann Trail. This photo was taken after a time of steady rains in September 2013.

Westside Pioneer file photo

I vividly remember the meetings when the 2013 Master Plan for the expanded Red Rock Canyon Open Space was developed. The Intemann Trail Committee's passion and persistence in those meetings succeeded in getting the Waterfall Trail included in the Master Plan.
       A friend and I recently hiked the partly re-routed Intemann Trail. We saw that a very short section of the original trail had been closed, chopped up, and bypassed in order to sever the connection of the Waterfall Trail to the Intemann Trail. Not only was this inconsistent with the Master Plan, it was also an affront to the nearly three decades of dedication, thoughtfulness and hard work of the Intemann Trail Committee.
       While I can't say that I actually dislike the new route, I am dismayed by the Colorado Springs Parks Department's insensitivity to the mountainside environment which was damaged by the machinery which built the new trail segments. I am also dismayed by the seeming insensitivity to the legacy of the hundreds of volunteers who worked over the years to create the original Intemann Trail.
       In my view, the memory of what has happened to the Intemann Tail should weigh heavily on the decisions of future volunteers who might anticipate the legacy of their own hard work being bulldozed at the city's whim.

       Don Ellis

(Posted 6/2/17; Opinion: Letters)

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