The Forest Service is seeking public comment on a plan to demolish the old Grit Mill less than a mile up Little Cottonwood Canyon, on the North side of the road. The granite cliffs above are popular with rock climbers and the plan is to develop a nice parking area for them along with trails connecting it to the UTA parking lot at the base of the canyon.
Restoration » Project also will improve trails accessing Little Cottonwood climbing routes.
A dilapidated grit mill will be removed soon from the mouth of Little Cottonwood Canyon, where an improved trail system will be developed to access the canyon’s renowned rock-climbing routes.
The U.S. Forest Service cleared the way for the recreation-oriented beautification project last week in an environmental assessment that determined no significant impacts would result.
“It’s a great project,” said Jessie Walthers, executive director of the Cottonwood Canyons Foundation, a nonprofit dedicated to promoting environmental stewardship in Little Cottonwood and Big Cottonwood canyons.
“We’re all excited to see a new plan for that area. Visually, that [grit mill] structure had such a negative impact on the canyon,” she said, adding she is also pleased that the Forest Service approved a 35-vehicle parking lot for the site that is accessible to mass transit.
“It’s a huge milestone for the Salt Lake Climbers Alliance,” added Julia Geisler, that group’s executive director.
Besides strengthening the working relationship between climbers and the Forest Service, the project “sets a precedent for better trails in the Wasatch for climbers and other non-motorized recreation. … Ultimately, it will protect and enhance the climbing resource in lower Little Cottonwood Canyon.”
According to the environmental assessment, the grit mill was a “contributing feature” of the Whitmore quarry, a historic site on the National Register as the site of many rocks used to build the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints’ temple in downtown Salt Lake City.
Out of use for more than half a century, the mill had become a graffiti-covered eyesore and a threat to the safety of people goofing around on the structures. In addition, it was a gateway to an informal system of trails cut over time to the nearby climbing routes. Many of those accelerated erosion by being in the wrong places.
The Forest Service decision addressed safety and environmental concerns. It provides for:
• Demolition of the mill, all-related structures and industrial equipment using heavy machinery;
• Construction of a 35-space trailhead parking lot, with a restroom and interpretive site, that will be closed from Nov. 1 to April 1, depending on snow;
• Completion of 1.4 miles of new trail, upgrading three-quarters of a mile of existing trail and closing almost a mile of ill-advised current trails to access the climbing routes; and
• Installation of water bars and retaining walls at the bases of numerous climbing routes to improve erosion control.
“This has been a great collaborative effort,” Walthers said, noting that the involvement of Cottonwood Canyons Foundation members will increase markedly after mill structures are removed and rehabilitation work turns to removing invasive weeds and planting native vegetation.
That work is likely to take place in the summer of 2015.