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PUBLIC ACCESS A place to play Elk Creek Basin land to be transformed into recreation site Comment By Mark Freeman Mail Tribune MailTribune.com By Mark Freeman Mail Tribune Posted Apr. 6, 2015 at 2:00 AM Updated Apr 6, 2015 at 5:10 PM By Mark Freeman Mail Tribune Posted Apr. 6, 2015 at 2:00 AM Updated Apr 6, 2015 at 5:10 PM » RELATED CONTENT • Timeline for Elk Creek Dam • Elk Creek Dam Recreation Site » Social News TRAIL — A swath of the Elk Creek Basin once meant to be 100 feet under water is in its final phase of being transformed into a low-intensity recreation site amid prime fish and wildlife habitat. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers has hired contractors to finish off access road reconstruction and other projects to turn its former Elk Creek Dam holdings into a day-use recreation site for everyone from hikers and bikers to horseback riders and hunters to enjoy lands once tapped to be the base of Elk Creek Lake. Catworks Inc. of Battle Ground, Wash., has an $880,000 contract to reseal the public-access road to the Yellow Rock trailhead, replace an old wooden bridge with one pedestrian bridge and rebuild one vehicle bridge. The work is meant to help the public take advantage of walk-in access to part of the Corps' 3,500 acres, including a 7-mile stretch of an old Jackson County road that will serve as a trail among Elk Creek swimming holes, grassy fields and complex wildlife habitats. "It's not going to be high-density," says Jim Buck, the Corps' Rogue Basin operations manager. Members of the public slowly have discovered the area in recent years, either hiking or biking the road or venturing near the old dam site, which remains closed to the public. Camping remains banned, Buck says. Visitors also check out the complex rehabilitation project for the creek stretch near the dam, most of which was blown out in 2008. "Whenever I've been in there, folks are hiking," Buck says. "Certainly, in the hunting season, it's always been popular. But it seems the general public doesn't know where to go. They're not quite sure what it's all about."  The work began Wednesday when contractors began falling and chipping trees along a 10-foot strip on both sides of the access road to a parking lot, where a vault toilet was installed during the first phase of this project two years ago. Some of the larger trees will be stashed aside to be placed in Rogue River Basin streams to help create complex fish habitat, Buck says. The vehicle-access gate off Elk Creek Road near milepost 2 will remain closed through April as part of the regular seasonal closure. It will be open from May 1 through Oct. 31, as it has since 2009. However, access will be restricted occasionally in June when Catworks crews replace the bridges and finish chip-sealing the access road. "It's going to be a little inconvenient, but our goal is to get out of here pretty quickly," Catworks project manager Brad Nea says. "It'll be a summer with a little inconvenience to the public. "Come fall, we'll be a memory," he says. The Elk Creek Dam saga conjures many memories of this project since the Corps purchased private lands in 1971 to become the site of Elk Creek Lake, one of three Rogue Basin reservoirs envisioned by the agency for flood-control and fisheries management here. Lost Creek and Applegate dams were completed, but Elk Creek Dam's construction was halted in 1988 over environmental lawsuits. The Corps could not legally complete the half-built dam because it couldn't create mitigation to offset the warmer waters that would flow out of the reservoir and alter Rogue salmon habitat. So it was notched in 2008 to allow fish passage into the upper basin that is considered important spawning and rearing habitat for wild steelhead and coho salmon, which are protected as a federally threatened species. Most of the land has remained open to the public, except areas immediately upstream and downstream of the dam's remnants. Shortly after the dam's notching, the Corps spent about $2 million to turn the creek channel upstream of the dam from a moonscape to thriving complex habitat for wild coho and steelhead. "Elk Creek hasn't been a win-win all the way around," Buck says. "My desire here is to reconnect the public with this area." Reach reporter Mark Freeman at 541-776-4470 or [email protected]. Follow him at www.twitter.com/MTwriterFreeman. By Mark Freeman Mail Tribune MailTribune.com By Mark Freeman Mail Tribune Posted Apr. 6, 2015 at 2:00 AM Updated Apr 6, 2015 at 5:10 PM » Comment or view comments Reader Reaction » STAY INFORMED Email NewsLetter Sign Up Today Sign up for our newsletter and have the top headlines from your community delivered right to your inbox. Southern Oregon Directory Featured Businesses Loading... 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