The Sedona City Council unanimously voted to approve a new five-year agreement with the U.S. Forest Service to provide $60,000 per year for non-motorized trail maintenance and improvements on trails within or adjacent to city limits during its Tuesday, June 27 meeting. The city’s current agreement with the Forest Service, which provides $40,000 in funding per year, will expire on Oct. 23. The city’s contribution was last increased over a decade ago.
The city’s $60,000 will cover 30% of the $195,000 annual cost of Forest Service trail crews’ work in and around Sedona, with the Forest Service providing the remaining 70%.
The majority of the expenses are for two trail crew supervisors and six recreation technicians, with minimal equipment and vehicle expenses.
Under the prior agreement, Sedona’s contribution of$40,000 was intended to be a 50-50 cost share with the Forest Service.
“Since the late ’90s, the Coconino National Forest and the city of Sedona have been working together primarily to accomplish goals set forth in the city trails urban pathways plan and the Forest Service Amendment 12,” Red Rock Ranger District staff officer Brooke Andrew told the council. “That’s aimed at maintaining and improving non-motorized trail systems located on National Forest System lands adjacent to the city.”
Amendment 12 to the Coconino National Forest Management Plan was a land conservation amendment affecting Forest Service land around Sedona that detailed management goals. It was later codified into an updated management plan.
There are more than 400 miles of trails within the Red Rock Ranger District that are used by over 3 million annual visitors, with over 75% of that use taking place near Sedona and the Village of Oak Creek.
Trail Use
Boynton Canyon’s visitation exceeded that for Cathedral Rock Trail during February and March this year, with 26,260 and 21,473 users respectively, possibly because construction at Cathedral Rock has driven users elsewhere. Cathedral Rock previously saw over 25,000 monthly visitors in October 2020 and March 2021.
“The Instagrammers create an environment where it kind of shifts the wave of trail interests in this community and the Boynton Canyon area has become popular,” Sedona Fire District Fire Chief Ed Mezulis said. “Anecdotally, 10 years ago, it was Bell Rock and Cathedral.”
Mezulis said that the longer amount of time required to respond to medical calls from Boynton Canyon trailhead has not affected SFD’s ability to respond elsewhere. Forest Service Recreation Management Specialist Kevin Kuhl said that a new Forest Service preventive search and rescue program, launched after an especially busy summer 2021 day when there were 27 emergency medical service calls, has also increased capacity.
“This is another arm of [the] Friends of the Forest that developed in response to that crunch on our EMS service,” Kuhl said. “When they’re going to go help a lost hiker or dehydrated hiker, they can’t be attending more serious concerns. In this short time, they have been working on busy weekends during the summer holiday weekends, staffing Bell Trail and Devil’s Bridge.”
During the past two years, preventive search and rescue volunteers have contributed $37,047 worth of labor over 1,165 hours at the two locations. Funding from the Great American Outdoors Act was used at Cathedral Rock “to secure eight weeks of American Conservation Experience crews and six weeks of professional contract trail crew Summit to Sea Trails Specialist LLC to assist with constructing armored rock check steps, retaining walls, armored drainage dips and construct 700 feet of fencing to delineate the trail in conjunction to [the] restoration of social trails,” according to the USFS trail report to council.
Signs have also been updated at more than 150 trail junctions, with the new signs focusing on bikers with instructions such as “Preferred Directional Route” and “Double Black Diamond” signage at locations like Hangover.
“If you’ve ever tried to take a bike on [Hangover], good luck,” Kuhl said. “It’s a pretty challenging experience.”
Councilman Pete Furman expressed an interest in expanding gravel biking opportunities in West Sedona during the meeting. Kuhl noted that the Forest Service is in the very early stages of “looking at ways to identify opportunities for that user group.”
“I think that [West Sedona] could be one of the premier destinations for gravel biking in the United States. But the conflict with the use of OHVs keeps that from taking off,” Furman said.
He argued the Forest Service should manage West Sedona for greater multiuse recreational activity and that “it doesn’t have to be all” OHVs in that area. “I don’t know that gravel biking will alleviate conflict,” Furman said. “But the Forest Service could maintain its stance about being open for recreation if it was able to figure out a plan [such as] alternate days [of use] special trails for one, special trails for the other, and facilitate both uses out there.”
Future
In the upcoming fiscal year the district’s trail crew will be repairing the Bell Rock, Carrol Canyon, Chapel, Dry Creek, Hangover, Huckaby, Hogs, Sugarloaf, Thunder Mountain and Western Gateway trails. The first half-mile of the Soldier Pass trail is scheduled to receive fencing, improved drainage and rock step reconstruction.
Sedona Red Rock Trail Fund president Kevin Adams told the council that $195,000 under-represents the full cost of area trail maintenance because of the volunteer contributions made by the Back Country Horsemen, Friends of the Forest, the Sedona Westerners, the Verde Valley Cyclists Coalition and local businesses.
“I’d like to thank you for reducing the annual cap we have to raise every year by $20,000,” Adams said to the council.
“Another future item that we haven’t quite announced yet — we’re in the infancy of the project — [is] theVerde Valley Circle Trail,” Kuhl said. “That’s another multi-jurisdictional project. We’re working with all the different towns and land managers to plan roughly a 100-mile circle trail that goes all the way around the Verde Valley and kind of connects to all of our communities.”
The ongoing Red Rock Trails Enhancement National Environmental Policy Act Expansion is slated to include the expansion of the Turkey Creek trail near the Village of Oak Creek.
“This project will add [about] 35 miles of non-motorized single track to this system through user adoption and new construction,” the district’s 2023 trails accomplishment report stated. “Additional routes, [the] Singletrack bypass extension, [the] Rector connector bypass and Hardline in the Village of Oak Creek area will increase connectivity and reduce user conflict.
“[The] Oak Creek Elementary School single-track trail project will build roughly three miles of trail on gentle flowing terrain and add trails in the community of Cornville that has limited access to this type of recreational opportunity. “Doe Mountain Loop trail will adopt the user-created perimeter trail on Doe Mountain. [The] Scheurman Mountain connector increases the connectivity of the two systems of trails on either side of Red Rock Loop Road and reduces users entering Red Rock High School Property during school hours.”
The environmental review process is ongoing and the Forest Service is awaiting the completion of an archaeology survey in late summer, followed by public scoping with a final decision anticipated in spring 2024.
