Climate change is muddying the future of trail maintenance in Southeast Alaska

Meghan Tabacek, the executive director of Trail Mix Inc., stands over an anti-erosion “gabion basket” on Juneau’s Black Bear Trail.

Tabacek is the executive director of Trail Mix, Inc., a local non-profit that spends each summer clearing brush, downed trees and — occasionally — landslide debris, on trails managed by the City and Borough of Juneau, the state and the Forest Service.“We’re used to mud,” Tabacek said. “Mud is our bread and butter.”

Erosion is eating away at the bank of lower Montana Creek, which borders the Black Bear Trail. Rapid stream erosion is one of the most common threats to Juneau’s trails. “They go up narrow canyons. They’re going along creeks,” said King, referring to routes which make trails vulnerable to threats like landslides and erosion. “Some of these trails just aren’t in the right spot.”

“So rerouting, rethinking how we get people through these places and how we build infrastructure that’s more resilient, that reduces that long term maintenance? That’s a big goal of ours,” King said.

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Climate change is muddying the future of trail maintenance in Southeast AlaskaTrail crews face a growing intensity of the mud, the erosion and the wash-outs that are wreaking havoc on trails as human-caused climate change makes rainstorms more extreme.
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