Cleetwood Cove Trail to close for up to three years during reconstruction efforts
By Lee Juillerat for Ashland.news
CRATER LAKE NATIONAL PARK – Time is getting short to see and experience Crater Lake up close.
The Cleetwood Cove Trail, which provides the only access to the lake, is open but will be closing for up to three years for reconstruction. Until the snow flies or November 1 – whichever comes first – the most popular trail at Crater Lake National Park is accessible and drawing steady groups of visitors. The concession-operated boat tours, however, have ended for the season and will not be offered during the trail closure.
The 1.1-mile trail drops 700 feet from East Rim Drive to the lake. Visitors are urged to remember the climb from the lake to the trailhead is steep and challenging.
Park officials emphasize the closure affects the Cleetwood Cove Trail only. Some news media have incorrectly said the park will be closed, which is causing concern to park visitors.
The park is actually open daily, but during the winter season, only the road to park headquarters and Rim Village is open because of heavy snow, which amounts to more than 500 inches annually.
East Rim Drive, which is undergoing a multi-year major rehabilitation, recently reopened. A section of the 33-mile road that loops around the lake and the Pinnacles Road had been closed this season. The road work is being done in segments over a four- to five-year period. The construction is extremely limited because of the heavy snowfall.
According to park officials, Rim Drive was built in the 1930s. Over the years the narrow, wavy, potholed, rockfall-damaged road has been structurally failing and in desperate need of an upgrade. The project will stabilize the road, replace sections of pavement, and incorporate modern safety standards for sight lines, curvature, and elevation changes to ensure a consistent travel width and more stable shoulder.
The upgrade will also “repair guard walls on several damaged historic rock walls, improve drainage structures, prevent further erosion, strengthen shoulders, and enhance parking areas with accessibility-compliant slopes, markings, curb cuts, walkways, and overlooks,” according to a news release.
Crater Lake also has new acting superintendent, Charles Beall. He replaces Elexis Fredy, who had been the park’s interim superintendent since June. Fredy has returned to her job as superintendent at San Juan Historical Site and Ebey’s Landing National Historical Reserve in Washington. Beall’s National Park Service career began in 1996 at the National Mall in Washington, D.C.
Beall, who began duties at Crater Lake last week, is permanently stationed at Klondike Gold Rush-Seattle Unit National Historic Park. He and Fredy had begun transition planning before her departure.
Crater Lake has been without a permanent superintendent since June, when Kevin Heatley, who had taken the position in January, abruptly resigned. In making his resignation, Heatley cited deep staffing reductions he said are unsustainable. In an interview discussing his resignation, Heatley said he “did not want to be empowering the current administration to cause that kind of impact on the people that I’m responsible for,” adding, “And I did not want to participate in the dismantlement of the National Park Service.”
Email freelance writer Lee Juillerat at [email protected].
