Description
Start Date-End Date: 11/14/2019-11/14/2019
Land Manager Office: City of Boulder Open Space and Mountain Parks
Land Manager Contact: Beau Clark
Funding Partner:
Programmatic Partner:
Summary: Restore the High Plains Trail near south Boulder.
Description: Where You'll Be:
The High Plains Trail travels through the southern end of the City of Boulder Open Space & Mountains Parks and was built in 2006 to serve as a boundary to a designated Habitat Conservation Area, protectinga number of high-value natural resources including ground- and shrub-nesting birds, xeric tallgrass, prairie dogs, and wetlands.
What You'll Do:
On this Thursday project, you'll join approximately 50 volunteers aged 14+ to restore the High Plains Trail near beautiful Boulder. After a light breakfast provided by our volunteer Crew Chefs, you'll help repair about 1,100 ft. of trail by adding a more stable material to the trail tread, helping to eliminate the trail's often muddy condition and be resilient to the effects of erosion. Lunch will also be provided.
Why It Matters:
The High Plains Trail was designed to protect the nearby natural resources, but flat terrain and clay soils make this trail consistently wet and muddy. This leads to users going off-trail in search of dry ground, widening the trail and creating unsustainable, user-created "social trails" that harm the natural environment. By volunteering on this project, you will help make the High Plains Trail more sustainable and more enjoyable for years to come.
Need-to-Know Details:
Minors under 16 must be accompanied by an adult 21 years or olderon single-day projects.
VOC will provide all equipmentincluding tools and work gloves.
Cancellation:Our partners rely on VOC volunteers to accomplish critical stewardship needs, and our projects often have wait lists.If you need to cancel, please emailoutreach@voc.orgor call 303-715-1010 ext. 116 as soon as possible so we can free your spot for another volunteer and have a full workforce.
About Volunteers for Outdoor Colorado (VOC)
Volunteers for Outdoor Colorado (VOC) is the state's oldest, largest, and leading outdoor stewardship nonprofit organization. Founded in 1984 to motivate and enable people to become active stewards of Colorado's natural resources, VOC has engaged nearly 120,000 people in more than 1,000 volunteer projects for a donated labor value of $24 million. Through award-winning youth and volunteer programs, leadership training, capacity-building programs, and collaborative efforts with nonprofits and land management agencies, VOC is an invaluable resource in Colorado, especially as our outdoor stewardship needs are approaching near-crisis levels. For more information, visitwww.voc.orgor call 303-715-1010.
Latitude/Longitude: 39.914216, -105.206694
Additional Information:
Camping Available: No
Physical Difficulty: Easy
High Altitude Project: No
Desired Number of Volunteers: 50
Total Adult Volunteers Attended: 40
Total Youth Volunteers Attended: 0
Total Volunteer Days: 40
Total Unique Volunteers: 40
Total Volunteer Hours: 345.5
Staff Hours: 26
Stipend Hours: 0
Project Summary: we finally made this project happen! project was initially scheduled for 10/10 but was snowed out. then it was rescheduled for 10/31 and was snowed out again. We decided to give it one more shot and scheduled it for 11/14 and we had a beautiful day! volunteer numbers were lower than we wanted which i think was due to changing the date so many times. We ended up with 40 folks instead of our desired 50. Beau was a little nervous that we were not going to be able to complete everything but shifted the work so that we would hit the priorities. the group completed the priorities then completed all the other work that Beau lined out that he did not think we would get to. and we finished early. The city of boulder staff was super appreciative that we worked with them so much and rescheduled for a second time to make this project happen. This was something that they needed to get done before the winter and there was no way that they would have been able to do it all themselves. the volunteers all commented that they really enjoyed the later season opportunities since most organizations finish up in October like we were supposed to. Over all a raging success!
Accomplishemts: 1200 linear feet of trail improved by laying 60 tons of road base. ahead of the project, city staff excavated 3 inches of soil so that that we could get a thick layer of road base in. volunteers dispersed all 28 cubic yards of this excavated soil so that it was not piled up on the side of the trail
Successes and Challenges: successes - beth came out on the project and was able to get her first taste of VOC projects and project management. city of boulder had plate compactors that we were able to use throughout the project area as we were laying down the road base.
challenges - finding a date to make this project happen! late season snow made us reschedule twice.
Lessons Learned: volunteers really dug the November project option. maybe this is something we consider in the future.
Special Notes: we got tons of great feedback from users that passe through as we were working.
Stewardship Education:
Key Concerns or Comments from Staff or Volunteers:
Description of Accidents/Incidents:
Description of Work Completed:
Details
| 14 and older |
