Cottonwood Canyon State Park

Cottonwood Canyon State Park plan goes to our Commission next week

cottonwoodcanyon — Thu, 14 Jul 2011 21:59:46 +0000

The Oregon State Parks and Recreation Commission will review the final draft plan for Cottonwood Canyon State Park at its July 20 meeting in Bandon. Here’s the file:

Here’s where we are in the guesstimated timeline:

April 25 – May 5 >> Last Round Public Meetings DONE
May 26 >> Comment Period Closed DONE
July 20 >> Final Draft Submitted for Commission Review
Fall 2011 >> Land Use Approval Process
Fall 2011 >> Environmental Assessment work with BLM initiated
Spring – Summer 2012 >> Construction
Park Opening >> September 2013

The Draft Plan

cottonwoodcanyon — Thu, 21 Apr 2011 22:58:35 +0000

The draft plan, maps and some display boards will be presented at the public meetings in April and May. Here they are (all are PDFs, so you’ll need the Acrobat Reader):

Draft plan

Maps for Chapter 1, Chapter 2, Chapter 3, Chapter 7, Chapter 9, Chapter 10

Display boards

April public meetings

cottonwoodcanyon — Wed, 23 Feb 2011 21:00:50 +0000

During these months we’ve spent listening to public ideas about the new park, staff and consultants have also been busy examining the landscape and doing a dizzying number of natural, recreational and cultural reviews. All this is coming together to present a first draft of the park plan in April. Here’s the schedule:

Monday, April 25, 6-8 p.m: Sherman County Public Library, Program Room, Moro
Tuesday, April 26, 6-8 p.m: Veterans Memorial Hall, Condon
Thursday, April 28, 6-8 p.m: Tryon Creek State Natural Area, Portland
UPDATE: Thursday, May 5, 6-8 p.m: East Bend Public Library, Bend

These meetings will include presentations of the draft and open them for comment. Obviously, we aren’t adopting or setting anything in stone on these dates.

The public comment period for the drafts will open at the meeting and last through May 27. The final draft will follow, and be presented to the Oregon State Parks and Recreation Commission in July. If they approve of the plan, the next stop is county land use for their review.

We’ll post the April public meeting materials — including a copy of the draft plan — right here when they’re ready.

Read the complete February Planning Newsletter for Cottonwood Canyon.

New FAQ added

cottonwoodcanyon — Mon, 22 Nov 2010 19:54:40 +0000

A dozen questions, a dozen answers. See something missing? Just ask.

November public meeting dates and materials

cottonwoodcanyon — Wed, 27 Oct 2010 16:39:40 +0000

We’ll be answering more questions and presenting some draft ideas for the park. As soon as the materials are available, we’ll post them online so you can comment here, but do try to attend a meeting as well if you can:

Monday Nov. 15 – Moro – 6 pm – Sherman County Public/School Library
Tuesday Nov. 16 – Condon – 6 pm- Veterans Memorial Hall
Monday Nov. 22 – Portland – 6 pm- Tryon Creek State Natural Area

Meeting materials …

The documents below represent our first, early ideas for the park based on what you’ve told us and the results of a bucketload of on-the-ground inspections. These ideas reflect what the fully-evolved park would look like in the decades after opening in 2013. Tell us what you think.

The planner’s presentation (includes many of the individual maps below, plus a description of the process).

Overall park plan. The red lines are trails, some for horses (mainly on the Gilliam County side and accessed from the JS Burres parking area). Most of the trails are just re-used existing jeep roads, though some are new.

Areas suitable for development based on plant communities.

Park opportunities, showing generally where recreation and natural resources take turns being the lead priority.

Plant restoration focus areas. We have some work to do to defeat weeds and bring back native plants.

Initial ideas for the west entrance, near the current Murtha Ranch right off Hwy 206. This is where most of the formal park development would be. Keep the large, red barn as a meeting area, add a small Welcome Center, picnic area, trailhead, and including a basic 35-site campground (by design, the sites can be used by either tents or RVs, but here are no RV utilities), plus cabins, a small group camp and a walk-in camp. Riparian restoration to bring back riverside plants. One thing you don’t see on the map is a small horse camp across the river and next to the J.S. Burres parking lot. There would be a trailhead there for equestrians, hikers and bicyclists.

Esau Canyon. Trail connections, riparian restoration, small hike-in and boat-in camps.

Hay Creek. Trail connections, riparian restoration including return of the hardwood forest, small horse camp, group tent camp, hike-in camp.

All of these ideas have to work hand-in-hand with habitat restoration and respect the rugged nature of the landscape (and the rules that cover state scenic waterways and federal wild and scenic designations).

So, what do you think?

Comment on updated park values and actions

cottonwoodcanyon — Tue, 24 Aug 2010 22:30:07 +0000

We introduced an newly-edited version of our “Park Values and Benefits” at the public meetings that ended yesterday evening. When we say “Values,” we’re trying to put into words the rationale for creating the park in this specific place. It’s easy to get lost in the big picture, though, and plans aren’t plans unless they give you concrete advice on how to design and guide the evolution of a park over the next several decades.

With that in mind, here are the Seven Big Character-Defining Values driving the park forward. Each is supposed to deliver certain benefits (those are listed). And to provide those benefits, we have to perform some action to make it happen. Those are listed with each value.

Where did the seven values come from? From you, and from the sudden realization that we manage three main resources: natural, cultural and recreational. Each of these three overlap, too (some parks are a mix of natural+cultural features, or recreational+natural, and so on), producing three more unique combinations. That makes six. And because it’s important for a a park to exist as part of a community, that makes seven.

Take a look, and comment by Sept 22. You can leave a comment here, or send one by email.

Go to the new values.

August public meeting dates

cottonwoodcanyon — Mon, 26 Jul 2010 19:44:42 +0000

Our second round of public meetings in Moro, Condon and Portland are coming up in August.

August 16th
High School Library
65912 High School Loop in Moro
6-8 p.m.

August 17th
Gilliam County Courthouse
Conference Room in Condon
6-8 p.m.

August 23rd
Tryon Creek State Park
Visitor Center in Portland
6-8 p.m.

First round of meetings finished — but don’t let that stop you

cottonwoodcanyon — Fri, 07 May 2010 17:11:03 +0000

We had a trio of great meeting last week, and if you couldn’t male one of them, not to worry. This is the beginning, not the end. Appropriate to the start of something new, wildflowers are also in bloom right now.

We held meetings in Moro, Condon and Portland (we’ll get video of the Moro meeting up so you can see what you missed and actually participate as if you were there).

People turned out and shared their early desires and concerns, and that helps the planning process tremendously. This early on, hearing from as many people as possible helps us to two big things over the next 1-2 years: first, make the park serve your needs for outdoor and cultural recreation, and second, protect it and the communities around it from unwanted side-effects.

We have an advisory committee of local, regional and state people to help us consider this new park from every angle, but we also need a constant conversation with the people who will use, or live near, the park.

So park staff will spend the next several months continuing to take your comments (make them here, or send us an email), and at the same time do a massive amount of inventory work. Looking at plants, animals, soils, even doing cultural reviews, is all part of the process. As the experts complete their work, we’ll look for results that we can distill down and place here on the site.

These first meetings came at a special time for the park: wildflowers are in bloom. Here are a few photos (more at Flickr) of the meeting and the flowers showing off the same day …

White brodiaea

Gall on big sage

Phlox

Planning maps

Public meeting in Moro

Monkey-flower

A jump start on planning

cottonwoodcanyon — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 20:40:48 +0000

If you show up at the first round of planning meetings near Cottonwood Canyon State Park and in Portland next week, you’ll start off with a couple presentations by our staff (and none are snooze-worthy … really), and then move between some displays that prompt you to share your thoughts about the park’s potential.

Want a sneak peek at those displays? Download the boards right now (10 MB).

We’ll also have video of the April 26 meeting online early next week so you can offer some specific comments just like the people who attend the meeting in person.

The start of something wonderful

cottonwoodcanyon — Thu, 08 Apr 2010 19:54:19 +0000

Cottonwood Canyon State Park will open in 2013. Years off, right? It’s closer than you think.

And it takes years to plan what will probably be the most important new state park in a generation. More than 8,000 acres along the lower John Day River, with sweeping vistas and deep canyons. We’re working with partners — nonprofits, other governments, locals — to start down the planning road, but it’s the sort of thing we need your help to plan, too.

And that’s where this blog comes in. We’ll announce meeting dates for those of you who prefer the personal touch, but as we come up with questions, photos, videos, maps and other documents, we’ll put them here so you can look them over and share your thoughts.

That’s it. Take a look around (start here if you don’t know what to do next), and don’t be shy.