First things first. It is not now and never has been the position of the Sierra Club to engineer the end of the Pikes Peak Auto Hill Climb. It is, however, our firm contention that paving the Pikes Peak Highway is absolutely necessary if we are to begin to reverse years of damage attributable to the management and maintenance of the highway as a dirt and gravel road. These of course are not separate issues. We’ve known literally for decades that historical drainage problems on and near the highway together with the process of maintaining the gravel surface have caused and are continuing to cause the degradation of natural systems on the mountain. Large areas of tundra as well as wetlands and forested valleys adjacent to the highway are choking in a growing accumulation of gravel washing off of the highway. The steadfast refusal of the Colorado Springs City Council to address these problems with more than studies which only reinforce what we already know can only be explained in the context of the Auto Hill Climb. There is no doubt in our minds that at present the city is managing the highway to accommodate the needs of a narrow special interest and in the process is perpetuating the destructive consequences that have been documented numerous times and are now too serious to ignore.
Why does this continue? On the surface it simply appears to be just one more manifestation of the so-called "good old boy" network that many people allege dominates Colorado Springs city government. While this may be true, I believe the issues here are much more complex. Environmentally and economically neither the current management of the highway nor the Hill Climb itself have a leg on which to stand. Converting to a paved road surface will save the city hundreds of thousands of dollars in maintenance costs and will in all likelihood increase revenues from the highway because motorists generally prefer pavement to dirt. The Hill Climb can continue on a paved roadway, and who knows, it could prove to be more popular than ever. Even if race organizers chose to discontinue the race does anyone truly believe motel rooms, restaurants, campgrounds, and the highway itself would be anything but overflowing during perhaps the busiest holiday period of the summer season?
Surely many if not most fans of the race support its continuation in its current form because they enjoy it. I suspect, however, that many of those opposed to paving the highway support the race in its present form (regardless of the obvious destruction attributable to the highway managed to accommodate it) because changing or ending it would represent something of an assault on the history and traditions of the Pikes Peak region. Over the past several years, environmentalists have ridiculed those arguments of the Wise Use movement based on calls to preserve the "custom and culture" of the rural West as being little more than a scam to perpetuate destructive extractive uses of the land. While there is a great deal of truth in this critique, its tone is condescending and, I believe, somewhat insulting. Getting back to Pikes Peak, the Hill Climb is one of those events a significant portion of the community experiences every year, much like the Pikes Peak or Bust Rodeo, which is an expression of historical and cultural continuity.
Over the last several decades the Pikes Peak region has undergone dramatic change which if nothing else has slowly eroded the bonds of community which were present in an earlier and much smaller Colorado Springs. Today’s city like much of the rest of our society is characterized by a hyper-individualism and fragmentation which makes the fostering of any type of community spirit difficult. As a result many seek to preserve the vestiges of an earlier time when events such as the Pikes Peak Hill Climb were the source of a spirit and pride sadly missing from today’s culture.
Nostalgia , however, is not reason enough to allow the
destruction which is taking place on Pikes Peak to continue. The city must confront what
is quickly becoming an embarrassing black eye on the Pikes Peak region. The transformation
of the Hill Climb will be a regrettable outcome because it is part of our history, but as
a representation of where this community is going, in its current form it is an
anachronism. For the rest of us, we need to work much harder at rebuilding and
strengthening the community spirit of which the Hill Climb is but one expression.
by Rick Eckert 5/96
This was taken from the regularly featured column in the Timberlines Newsletter, published bimonthly by the Pikes Peak Chapter.
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131 Williams Street, Colorado Springs, CO 80905-1413 - Phone: (719) 592-0963
Last updated February 12, 1999.