Scott Swanson
Work is progressing on a 10-acre day use area at Short Bridge, about 10 miles east of Sweet Home, that is expected to be open by this fall.
The site will include picnic tables, parking, several interpretive kiosks and other signs, and a viewing area from which visitors will be able to see the river and the bridge, and an approximately half-mile trail.
The purpose of the project, as stated in U.S. Forest Service documents, is to provide a stopping point for travelers on the Over the River and Through the Woods Scenic Byway that includes safe parking, a safe place to view the Short Covered Bridge, built in 1945, and educate visitors about the history of the site.
“It’s a place where people like to stop and look at Short Bridge,” said new District Ranger Nikki Swanson. “It was unsafe, the way people were pulling over to look. We want to provide safe access, a place where they can park and look at the bridge safely.”
The project has been on the U.S. Forest Service’s horizons since 2013 and construction began in June of this year.
It was one of those discussed during Oregon Solutions Team meetings in 2014, in which representatives of a wide variety of government, nonprofit, corporate and individuals pledged to work toward establishing a South Santiam Community Forest Corridor east of Sweet Home. Funding for the project had already been procured at that time from federal grants, Swanson said.
Some of the elements of that project include establishing the day use site in Cascadia, creating a trail from Sweet Home to the Willamette National Forest and transferring ownership of Cascadia Cave from private to public ownership and protection. All of those are in various stages of progress, currently.
That site’s history includes use of the area by Native Americans, the activities of the Forest Service and work performed by the Civilian Conservation Corps, including a wall built of decorative stones and posts that remains on the site.
From 1935 to 1959 the 10-acre property contained the Cascadia Ranger District Headquarters, including a ranger house, warehouse and various other buildings used in the management of the Santiam and Willamette national forests.
The projected cost for the project is $315,000, funded by a grant from the Federal Highways Administration, which was interested in providing a safe pull-over spot for visitors, Swanson said.
The day use area plans include an interpretive graveled, ADA-accessible loop trail approximately half a mile in length that will wind through the facility. She said the facility will include a main kiosk, similar to the one at Sweet Home Ranger District Headquarters, and various interpretive signs explaining historical and natural features.
The parking lot will be paved with a special permeable asphalt that is engineered to let water drain through instead of run off into the South Santiam River.
“It will be interesting to see how that works,” Swanson said.
An overlook platform, to be built this fall, will allow visitors a chance to view the South Santiam River below. Swanson said original plans for the overlook were modified to preserve some “very large” trees at the site.
Originally, she said, there were plans to include a log stair platform but planners couldn’t locate a tree large enough – in the neighborhood of 8 feet in diameter – to do that.
A future phase of the project could include a restroom facility, Swanson said.
“We don’t have the funds for that, but if we have cost savings, we’d like to pursue a comfort station there,” she said.
Other possibilities suggested by members of the public have included yurts and a concessionaire.
“We will talk more about that as a community,” Swanson promised.
Local resident Jean Burger, known by many as the “mayor” of Cascadia, said developing more services at the site would help visitors and local residents.
“I sure think they need to put in a full-service restroom,” she said. “If you have a day use area and you don’t have a bathroom, they’ll go to (Cascadia) State Park or go in the woods.”
Burger said that since the community’s Post Office burned down, in November of 2011, communication within the community has diminished.
“Our communication is definitely lacking,” she said. “We lost our focal point, the Post Office. It used to be, whenever anybody would come or go, you’d know. Now you don’t. There’s no hub, so to speak.”