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Trail blazing Photo by Ray Pettengell Randy Hodges, a contractor from Shady Cove, uses a gas-powered wheelbarrow Wednesday to build a new section on the Lower Table Rock trail. The trail, hiked by 10,000 every year, is being rerouted and getting a new rock surface. Table Rock hike improved BLM to expand parking, replace restrooms, rebuild trail By PAUL FATTIG As Randy Hodges works on the Lower Table Rock trail, he can almost hear the tramp of 10,000 pairs of hiking boots marching behind him. That's how many people hike the popular Bureau of Land Management path to the top of the picturesque plateau each year. "It got quite a lot of use when I hiked it as a kid," said the trail contractor, a 1969 graduate of Medford Senior High School. "But it's a real high-use trail now. "Even in this weather, I see people out here every day," he added. "This is a neat project, and one that is overdue." The trail's growing popularity and related wear and tear are what prompted the BLM to launch a rehabilitation project this summer, complete with 2,200 feet of new trail while decommissioning three-fourths of a mile of old trail. In addition to the trail work, the agency is doubling the size of the parking lot and installing new restrooms. "We're getting 10,000 people out here a year and that figure is rising," said Randy Fiske, a BLM civil engineer who is the project inspector. "This trail is getting more popular all the time. "During the spring, we often have a full parking lot and cars down along the (Wheeler) road for a quarter mile," he added. "We had to do something." Part of the parking lot work calls for building a turnaround site for buses to accommodate field trips from local schools. "We have about 2,200 students out here each school year," he said. "Right now, buses have to back up around the kids. This will allow them to pull around." But the parking lot work won't be done until Hodges completes the trail work next month. During the parking lot phase of the project, the trailhead may be closed briefly. In September, the BLM, working with The Nature Conservancy, will replant and seed the portion of the trail that is being decommissioned. The temporary inconvenience caused by the project will be worth it to hikers, Fiske said. The project calls for adding a layer of shale to the trail. And since the new trail crosses areas of red clay that sticks to hikers' feet after a rain, a filter fabric will be installed between the clay and the rock layer. The dense clay "will pollute the gravel if we don't install a filter fabric," he said. "Without it, the heavy foot traffic will pump the subgrade into the rock." Rock water bars will also be installed to keep the new trail from being eroded by rainwater. "If you let that water build up some energy, that will do in a trail," Fiske said. "We're building the rock water bars along the trail. All you will have to do is step over them when you hike it." The old trail leaves the parking lot and follows a straight fence line before taking a sharp left and gradually ascending the rock. The new one instead meanders through an oak savanna before intersecting with the old trail part way up the plateau. Hodges cut only two small trees in building the new trail. "He is an artist who is willing to go the extra mile to do a good job," Fiske said. The Shady Cove resident, who has been building trail for more than two decades, is the Hodges in R.L. Hodges Construction Co. He has worked on countless Forest Service and BLM trails throughout the West. "This gives me a vent to be creative -- I sometimes look at it as my canvas," said Hodges, who has a business degree from what is now Southern Oregon University. "This is how I create art." The Lower Table Rock trail is not without its obstacles, he said. "The challenge is to line the entire trail with rock," he said. "That all has to be compacted. That's a lot of work" But one he figures will be appreciated by 10,000 pairs of feet. "A lot of people will be walking on this," he said. Mail Tribune Copyright � The Mail Tribune 1999, Medford, Oregon USA