Boardwalk protects redwoods
managers don’t refer to them that way and many environmental advocates believe their precise whereabouts should be kept secret.
But the Grove of Titans is too well known and easily accessed for secrecy. Several years ago, Gates said, the conversation among park managers became, “How can we protect this grove while still providing access to it?”
What followed was a $4 million project to realign 3 miles of the nearby Mill Creek Trail to the grove and install a 1,400-foot-long elevated boardwalk through it.
The boardwalk, which officially opens to the public Saturday, is a unique piece of infrastructure. Unlike the wooden, railed walkways that snake around the redwoods at Muir Woods National Monument, it is made of steel grates that allow dappled light to nourish the forest’s understory below.
“It feels like you’re walking on air,” Gates said.
Also, it’s built to withstand impacts from falling limbs that plummet hundreds of feet to the ground.
Replete with viewing platforms, the boardwalk is located about three-quarters of a mile in from the Grove of Titans trailhead off Howland Hill Road in the park. It also features interpretive signage detailing the land’s historic use by the Tolowa Dee-ni’ Nation and the tribe’s connection to the area today.
About a mile of Mill Creek Trail is still being widened and upgraded; the entire trail project should be complete by early summer, Gates said. It was funded in part by Save The Redwoods League, which is a San Francisco conservation nonprofit, and the Redwood Parks Conservancy in Crescent City.
The park has enlisted the help of a few dozen volunteers, the so-called Titaneers, to act as guides in the grove. They’ll don uniforms and walk the trail during busy summer weekends, retelling the history of the trees and dissuading people from venturing off the boardwalk.
“I feel this is a very responsible solution,” Gates said. “We don’t want to prevent people from going there, but we want them to avoid damaging the resource they came to see.”