PORT ANGELES — A mile-long portion of Waterfront Trail, closed after Native American burial remains were discovered in January, is expected to be reopened by Friday.
The section east of the vacant Rayonier pulp mill site was scheduled for reopening Feb. 10 but was delayed after new sections of the trail sloughed off onto to the Port Angeles Harbor beachfront, caused by heavy rain, said Port Angeles Parks and Recreation Director Corey Delikat last week.
Delikat said he was contacted last week by residents wondering when the popular section of the Olympic Discovery Trail east of the abandoned Rayonier pulp mill site would be accessible again to the public.
Work repairing the slides has blocked the Waterfront Trail, cutting it in two and making it impossible to walk, run or bicycle its length.
The slide occurred along a 2-mile section.
That work will begin anew Tuesday.
“We had a bunch of slides come down,” Delikat said Friday.
“It’s a matter of us getting down there and cleaning it up, hopefully by Thursday or Friday.”
Delikat said it should be open in plenty of time for the Feb. 29 Frosty Moss Olympic Discovery Relay, featuring 80- and 30-mile events, to be held.
“We should be good to go with everything,” Delikat said.
The work was done by Port Angeles and Clallam County public works crews.
It included laying fabric and riprap over exposed portions of the trail bank next to the Port Angeles Harbor shoreline where slides occurred, uncovering and despositing Native American remains estimated to be hundreds of years old.
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Senior Staff Writer Paul Gottlieb can be reached at 360-452-2345, ext. 55650, or at pgottlieb@peninsuladailynews.com.
