Victoria McCullough/Courtesy photo
An open house Wednesday, Aug. 27, will give residents a chance to hear from the U.S. Forest Service about its Southern Tenmile recreation access plan, which proposes improvements to trailheads, trails, signage, parking, campsites and shuttle systems.
The Southern Tenmile area includes some of Summit County’s most popular recreation sites — Spruce Creek, McCullough Gulch, Blue Lakes and Quandary Peak — all within the Camp Hale Continental Divide National Monument.
The access plan and management framework came from a study, initiated in April 2024, completed by the Volpe National Transportation Systems Center.
A U.S. Forest Service document outlining the access plan stated fees would be charged, designated campsites would require reservations and visitors would need to take a shuttle or reserve parking for the popular areas during the peak visitation season, which would roughly be June through September.
The area sees around 237,000 visitors a year, according to the document, and that “high visitation” combined with a “lack of facilities and infrastructure” needed to support it has “negatively impacted” the area.
The impacts listed include parking and traffic congestion in nearby neighborhoods, at trailheads and along roads and trails; trash and human waste accumulation; erosion and trampling of native vegetation; proliferation of user-created trails; damage to historic sites; and reduced access for emergency services.
To address parking and traffic issues, the plan looks to expand the shuttle and parking reservation system in place for Quandary Peak and McCullough Gulch to the other trailheads and campsites in the area during the peak season.
Blue Lakes would only get the shuttle and parking reservation system if the planned delineation of trailhead parking spaces, additional trail connections and other improvements do not eliminate parking and traffic issues. The 2024 access study suggested those changes would address the issues, the Forest Service document stated.
At Spruce Creek, the document stated, the parking reservation system would come before the shuttle system. It stated managing partners, including the Forest Service, Summit County and Town of Breckenridge, would implement the shuttle system in phases, as they did with the Quandary and McCullough Gulch shuttle.
The plan also would ban parking on roads outside the trailhead areas, which is currently common, especially for dispersed camping near some of the sites.
Designated dispersed campsites in the project area, specifically at McCullough Gulch and Spruce Creek, will either be included in the reservation system or closed. Blue Lakes, the document stated, has no designated campsites, but the plan calls for some to be created.
Changes to parking lots, elimination of roadside parking, growth of the shuttle system and the requirement of reservations for designated campsites would “limit daily use and flatten visitation patterns” during the peak season, according to the document.
The work would also reportedly result in an overall decrease in parking spaces in the project area.
Other proposed work includes improvements to the trailheads of the four popular sites, improvements to almost 12 miles of existing trails and about a quarter mile of existing road, and construction of about 3 miles of new trail connections.
Trailhead improvements include redesigning, replacing and adding trailheads, adding delineated parking spaces, adding signage, creating shuttle turn-around areas and adding or improving restrooms.
In May, Summit County government resource specialist Jordan Mead presented to the county commissioners about the plan, explaining details about changes to trailhead parking and different ways the management of the system could work, according to previous Summit Daily reporting.
Because users access the project area through county- or town-owned lands and roads, Mead said Volpe, the organization that conducted the study, recommended the Forest Service issue a special-use permit to a local government to manage sites in the area.
Volpe recommends using the special-use permit method at first, with plans to eventually move to the Federal Lands Recreation Enhancement Act model, which would allow the Forest Service to manage sites on its land.
The open house Aug. 27 will run from 5-7 p.m. at the Breckenridge Recreation Center. For more information, to find the Forest Service’s outlining document or to submit a comment, visit Bit.ly/TenMileAccessPlan. The Forest Service asks the public to submit comments by Sept. 15.
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