by Gabe Etengoff

Over 20 years ago, in 1997, the Continental Divide Trail Alliance (CDTA) began a program to take inventory of the CDT, called United Along the Divide One (UADI). Four years later, in 2001, a second effort to inventory the trail, called UADII, began. Both efforts were incredible undertakings and brought CDT stewards together around the common goal of understanding and documenting trail conditions.

The last inventory of the CDT is 18 years old; it’s once again time to undertake the tremendous challenge of inventorying conditions along the CDT. Due to budget cuts, Forest Service staff often times don’t have the capacity to inventory all segments of the CDT. With advanced technology, CDTC has the ability to mobilize a community of stewards and volunteers stretching along the entire 3100 miles of the CDT.

During UADI and UADII, volunteers were asked to use pen and paper to write their reports on trail conditions, then mail their physical reports to CDTA. With the help of new technologies, we no longer have to rely on pen and paper reports. Smartphones have made considerable strides, turning them into invaluable tools for hiking, route-finding, and even trail work. Through the data collection app Fulcrum, CDTC has developed a way to collect data and inventory conditions along the CDT using a smartphone. By utilizing smart phones to quickly and efficiently collect data, CDTC is able to maximize our volunteer capacity.

Our tremendous success during last year’s Blaze the CDT campaign will serve as a jumping-off point for this new endeavor. In addition to successfully signing much of the CDT, we effectively mobilized a web of volunteers, land managers, and non profits who assisted in Blazing the CDT. CDTC is planning on utilizing this interconnected web to roll out the full Rapid Trail Assessment (RTA) program in summer 2020.

This summer, CDTC will pilot and test the RTA application before undertaking a full rollout of RTA. Pilot locations include the Beaverhead-Deerlodge National Forest, Carson National Forest, Helena-Lewis and Clark NF, and Salmon-Challis National Forest. Look out for the full rollout of RTA next year!

Gabe Etengoff is CDTC’s Field Programs Coordinator. When not leading volunteer trips along the Divide, he can be found hiking, taking his labrador retriever to the dog park, or playing video games at his house in Denver.