Popular Adirondack High Peaks access point will be shut down for upgrades next week
The Garden trailhead and parking lot in Keene Valley will be closed Monday, June 23 through Wednesday, June 25 for road repairs, according to Keene Supervisor Joe Pete Wilson.
The steep, narrow gravel road had washed out several times due to recent storms, and Wilson said it had reached the point where a more permanent fix was needed.
“This will hopefully prevent us from having to close it every time we get a big storm,” Wilson said. “It’s time to bite the bullet, close it for a couple days, do the work properly and then have a more durable road for the spring and winter thaw.”
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The cost, which has yet to be determined, will be paid out of a hiker-fee fund drawn from those who pay $10 to park at The Garden, one of the main entryways to the High Peaks.
The parking lot had to be closed twice in the past year due to storms, and if a storm hit while the lot was full and washed out the road, a number of hikers could be stranded. “After those closures we had, I thought, oh my goodness, what would happen if that road washed out on a busy Saturday, and we had 40 cars stuck up there for a couple days till we could fix it,” Wilson said. “What would I do with those people? We don’t want to get in that situation.”
Wilson said he’d hoped to have been able to give more notice of the closure, but with contractors hard to find he had to jump at the opportunity when one became available.
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