[Tagging] Trailhead tagging

Kevin Kenny kevin.b.kenny at gmail.com
Mon Jan 14 22:04:25 UTC 2019


On Fri, Jan 11, 2019 at 12:16 PM Andy Townsend <ajt1047 at gmail.com> wrote:
> No - it really isn't.  That was my entire point.  I'm willing to bet a
> small round of beer in the pub up the road that almost no-one walking
> past that info board will say "oh look - that's a trailhead for the TPT".

On the other hand, I'll bet you a beer in Lake Placid that at least
half the people in the bar at the Adirondack Hotel in Long Lake
village would recognize that this sign
https://www.flickr.com/photos/ke9tv/14920080943/ - which simply stands
on the roadside at a path going into the woods, with no other
facilities right there - marks a trailhead for the Northville-Placid
Trail. (When I say 'no other facilities right there,' what I mean is
that there's a town about 4-5 km down the highway, and it's an easy
walk on the shoulder(verge) or an equally easy hitch.)

It's an important trailhead. Shattuck Clearing on the sign is the site
of a FORMER ranger station that burnt in the 1960's. Since its road
hasn't been maintained since then, it's grown to trees and entirely
impassable to anything on wheels, so while it serves as a landmark,
it's not an opportunity to get help or leave the trail. If you hike in
at that trailhead, except for a handful of spots on a lake where it
would be possible to land a canoe or water-taxi a float plane, there's
no other way out closer than Lake Placid. It's 58.6 km to the next
highway, about 63 km if you're walking to the town - or to turn around
back the way you came. "The last chance to leave the trail for the
next two or three days" is kind of important to map!

I'm therefore going to stick with 'designated or customary place to
begin or end a trip on a trail.'

As long as Peter is agreed that not all trailheads are anything
resembling TOP's and not all TOP's are trailheads, I think we're in
rough agreement. Where I get a bit prickly is at sweeping assertions
like "a trailhead must be something more than where a path crosses a
road."  When you're on a trail where it's 60 km between roads (the NPT
crosses four paved roads in 222 km), you're damned right that anywhere
that the trail crosses a road is a trailhead!



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