Using Historic Maps to Locate Trails and Understand Trail Building Practices on the Willamette National Forest, Detroit Ranger District

Summary

This is an abstract from the "SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts" session, at the 88th annual meeting of the Society for American Archaeology.

In the 1930s and 40s, Civilian Conservation Corps (CCC) crews built many fire lookout towers and trails on the Willamette National Forest and across the nation. Some of these structures and trails still exist today, but others have been lost to time. Digitizing historic trails from old maps may help cultural resource crews to relocate and protect them. However, only tracing the trails from the maps often proves inaccurate on the ground. This project seeks to compare digitized trails to least cost paths and corridors to attempt to identify factors that influenced trail construction and may help align the digitized trails to the landscape to increase the likelihood of rediscovery on the ground. Results indicate that historic trails rarely align with least cost paths but do often fall into 10% least cost corridors. The differences are likely influenced by preferences for shorter paths and avoiding streambeds. Further, historic trails and lookouts should be understood and examined as networks instead of individual resources.

This Resource is Part of the Following Collections

• SAA 2023: Individual Abstracts   •
• Society for American Archaeology 88th Annual Meeting, Portland, OR (2023)

Keywords

Record Identifiers

Abstract Id(s): 35910.0