Last weekend, as 30 mph wind gusts howled across a flat area known as the “Notch” on the side of Mount Baldy, three young men, looking cold and tired, climbed onto Los Angeles’ highest point. He staggered down from the top, looking very excited to have reached it. The county is in such a difficult situation.
Not only were they braving the summit’s soaring altitude and fierce winds, they were also risking a $5,000 fine for violating the U.S. Forest Service’s closure order.
After a wildfire ripped through the village of Mount Baldy in September, gutting 20 homes and burning more than 50,000 acres on the surrounding hillsides, the U.S. Forest Service said the mountain’s breathtaking All trails leading to the summit have been closed for over a year (until December 2025). Ensure public safety and promote the “natural recovery” of damaged and vulnerable plants and soil.
Hikers descend the popular ski area of Baldy Mountain.
(Genaro Molina/Los Angeles Times)
But did the three climbers who climbed the Devil’s Backbone, a narrow ridge flanked by spine-chilling drops on either side, see scorched earth and trees along the way?
“No, there was nothing. The trail was fine,” said Isaiah Rosas of Moreno Valley. “There were a lot of people climbing up and down with us.”
That’s the catch. The village 5,000 feet below was devastated by the Autumn Bridge Fire, but the summit and the most popular trail leading to it escaped largely unscathed.
So, like everything else in recent fragile public debates, the government’s closure of the mountain sparked a heated debate on social media. On the other side are so-called trail Karens who monitor online webcams and question why the Forest Service doesn’t ticket “ignorant and selfish” rule-breakers hiking the mountains. But other critics accuse the Forest Service of being another “useless” government agency that reflexively shuts things down in the name of “safety” at the expense of freedom.
Sound familiar?
Officials’ decision to allow recreational businesses to continue operating in closed areas despite suspected threats to plants and soil added fuel to the online fire.
These young men are among the many hikers who are defying the federal government’s closure of Mount Baldy’s trails, despite risking $5,000 fines.
(Genaro Molina/Los Angeles Times)
“It’s just screaming that capitalism is okay and has nothing to do with safety or protecting public lands,” one Reddit commenter wrote a few months ago in a particularly active thread.
“You can see that the underlying issue is not a safety issue or trying to restore the land. I think that’s why so many people don’t care about the closures and still hike,” said another. the person wrote.
Robbie Ellingson is the general manager of Mount Baldy Resort, a small, family-owned ski area located in the heart of a fan-favorite enclosed area of the mountain.
Ellingson said in an interview that because none of his ski slopes or equipment burned, he actively lobbied the Forest Service “to change the way we shut down.” But instead of changing the line on the no-go map, the forest department gave him a change allowing him to operate within the no-go zone. That means his restaurant and bar, located halfway up the mountain and aptly dubbed the “Top of the Notch,” remains open. His ski area will open as soon as there is enough snow.
The Mt Baldy trail closure was a devastating blow to the Mt Baldy Resort’s restaurant business. “We lost the entire fall,” general manager Robbie Ellingson said.
(Genaro Molina/Los Angeles Times)
Sipping a cold beer and admiring the expansive views from the restaurant is a much-needed reward after a long, hot hike to the top, so the closure of the popular trail in September was a boon for Ellingson’s business. It was a devastating blow.
“We wasted the entire fall,” he said. “We’ve been quiet about this and our discomfort with this,” but he’s hopeful the Forest Service will relent and reopen the trail in the spring once the snow melts. .
He said he hopes to maintain a good working relationship with Forest Service officials, but is concerned that the Forest Service’s complete and draconian closure decision will undermine the agency’s credibility.
Mr. Ellingson said public servants tend to mistakenly believe that “you can never be too safe.” But he thinks it can actually be done.
“When you try to be too safe, you end up with stupid rules that are counterproductive because so many people ignore them.”
U.S. Forest Service spokeswoman Dana Dierks confirmed in an email that the Devil’s Backbone and Ski Hut trails, the most popular trails to the summit, were not burned in the bridge fire. The closure is to “provide access to other trails where actual fires have occurred,” she wrote.
On the hillsides surrounding the burnt trails, “vegetation was completely consumed, leaving a landscape with no natural barrier to erosion,” she wrote.
The Forest Service is predicting “catastrophic landslides and massive debris flows within burned areas during the winter storm season,” and these risks will continue until vegetation regrows, Diakes said. .
“Once the seasonal weather has passed, we will re-evaluate the potential risk situation and see if certain areas can reopen,” Diakes said.
Outside the Mount Baldy Village Post Office and Fire Station last week, residents braced for possible landslides as the inevitable winter storm began to hit. Crews had set up concrete fences in front of houses across from the charred hillside. Some people were preparing a place to distribute sandbags.
But local residents also said the breadth and inflexibility of the trail closures seemed to defy common sense.
“I think this is unfair to businesses and local residents alike,” Mount Baldy Village resident Cindy DeBonis says of the extended trail closures on the mountain.
(Genaro Molina/Los Angeles Times)
Even the paved road around the corner that leads to great views of the valley is closed. So if the air is warm, the sun is shining, and there’s no obvious danger of a landslide from the burnt hillsides above, taking your dog for a morning walk down Glendora Ridge Road could theoretically could be fined $5,000.
“They keep saying it has something to do with the fire, but there’s nothing left to burn,” said longtime resident Cindy DeBonis, 63, shaking her head.
“I think this is unfair to both businesses and local residents,” she said. “I want to walk. I want to go hiking. This is where I live.”
