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Since 1999 the City of Boulder Department of Open Space and Mountain Parks has been working on developing a Visitor Plan. We've been following the process with some interest. During late 1999 and the spring of 2000, the first Visitor Plan Advisory Committee (whose members had been hand selected by the Open Space and Mountain Parks Department) developed a report which was published in March of 2000. A second Visitor Plan Advisory Committee was created at the beginning of 2003 to continue the process. The following material deals with the first Visitor Plan Advisory Committee process and results. Information on the second Visitor Plan Advisory Committee process is available at Visitor Plan Advisory Committee Two.
We'd hoped that the plan (originally called the Visitor Use Plan) would add some needed balanced to the department's approach to the recreational components of the Open Space charter and lead to enhancements and improvements in recreational opportunities on Open Space. Over the years the original plan seems to have transformed into a visitor management plan. In it's latest incarnation the plan proposes to divide Open Space and Mountain Parks lands into various categories with specific objectives and corresponding management tools. We support the department's desire to add clarity to area management objectives and agree that a one-size fits all approach is unrealistic.
On first reading the plan's goals and management strategies seem reasonable and appropriate. However, it's been said that the devil dwells in the details and the specifics of the proposed plan have been unavailable. The material that has been published seems to prioritize the Open Space charter's environmental preservation component above all others. For example, the recreational goals are said to be subject to the "overarching environmental values". Similiar qualifications exist throughout the material. This prioritization does not exist in the Open Space charter for a good reason. If one use is given absolute priority over all others it tends to always preempt them and may ultimately exclude them. Thus we are concerned with how the area definitions will be derived and how the management tools will be applied. The limited information available is not reassuring. There is a great deal of discussion of conservation areas and of limitations and restrictions on trails and recreation. There is little corresponding discussion of new recreational opportunities (e.g., new trails seem limited to reroutes of existing undesirable trails).
Hopefully all these concerns will be resolved when the detail Visitor Plan is available (it's presently scheduled for the middle of 2003). In the meantime we suggest you review the presently available materials. We've included links to the first Visitor Plan Advisory Committee Report (published March 10, 2000),and to the Visitor Plan goals and management strategies below (which in turn have links to the source materials). We've also included links to a Clay Evans Daily Camera column which eloquently articulates many of the same concerns we feel.