By Pepper Fisher

(UPDATE: We received the following statement from Superintendent Jacobs after publishing our story. “The Lower Elwha Klallam Tribe (LEKT) has long been a partner in the on-going protection and the continued restoration of Olympic National Park.  Specifically, the LEKT’s leadership, hard work, support and dedication was instrumental in removing the Elwha and Glines dams. As restoration continues in the Elwha valley, the park works closely with the LEKT to monitor fish returns, vegetation restoration, wildlife monitoring, as well as other resource indicators, and we continue to work with the LEKT in the planning process for Olympic Hot Springs Road. We look forward to determining next steps on access to this portion of the park.”

PORT ANGELES – Vehicle access to the Upper Elwha River Valley via Olympic Hot Springs Road has been shut down for four years since the road washed out. But it appears the effort to reopen access has been abandoned, and park officials aren’t saying why.

When the National Park Service released the Olympic Hot Springs Road Environmental Assessment (EA) in 2019 for a 45-day public review and comment period, it was an encouraging sign that things were moving along in getting the road reopened after washing out the previous year during heavy rains.

The road has been closed to automobile traffic since that time and has cut off all but walk-in access to the Upper Elwha River Valley region, including the former Glynes Canyon Dam site and some of the best hiking in the park. But in the last four years, there has been little or no word from park officials about what’s holding up the project.

The Environmental Assessment analyzed three options. One is a “no action” alternative, which would essentially abandon the road altogether, let the river run its course, and provide walk-in access only. Number two would modify the current road alignment to raise the grade and add a lot of bank infrastructure. And number three, the Park’s preferred alternative, is to reroute one mile of the road outside the floodplain.

We have learned the Lower Elwha Klallam Tribe objected to that plan in December of 2020. In two letters written to then Park Superintendent Sarah Creachbaum and obtained by KONP from the Tribe, Chairwoman Frances Charles says that while the Tribe supports reopening access to the park, they don’t support the preferred solution because of various environmental impacts it would have. Charles says other options were considered by National Park officials but were ultimately abandoned. The design the Tribe likes is to rebuild the road in the same basic location it’s in now, but to do it as an elevated causeway above the flood plain that would let the river flow, and allow salmon to swim, beneath it.

Could the Tribe’s opinion have something to do with why there has been no action thus far? We don’t know. Olympic National Park and National Park Service officials have so far refused to respond to our numerous requests for information on why the process appears stymied.

(Photo: Olympic Hot Springs Road washout)