Executive Summary

(download the Final Report)

Mill Creek Canyon, a local favorite along the Wasatch Front, offers a place for people to hike, bike, picnic, cross country ski, snowshoe, or simply experience nature. Mill Creek Canyon is located within the Central Wasatch Management Area of the Wasatch-Cache National Forest, and is immediately adjacent to the Salt Lake County urban area. The United States Forest Service is the majority land owner in Mill Creek Canyon, managing 81% of the land. In recent years, Salt Lake County and Forest Service representatives have noticed some often-recurring problems in Mill Creek Canyon:

• Overcrowding of key parking areas in both summer and winter peak seasons;
• Conflicts between vehicles, cyclists, and pedestrians on the roadway; and
• Environmental impacts associated with informal overflow parking initiated by visitors, including watershed degradation, loss of vegetation, and erosion.

In 2008 Salt Lake County and the Uinta-Wasatch-Cache National Forest applied for a Paul Sarbanes Transit in Parks and Public Lands grant from the Federal Transit Administration to analyze these issues and identify potential transportation alternatives to address the problems. Salt Lake County and the Forest Service were awarded the grant and the Mill Creek Canyon Transportation Feasibility Study began analysis in 2011.

Visitor activity was monitored over several days in summer 2011 and winter 2012. Automobile traffic, parked vehicles, and walking and cycling activity were highest on Saturdays, Sundays, and holidays. Traffic volumes and general visitor activity were lower on weekdays. Visitor activity is significantly higher in the summer; on average, traffic observed passing the fee booth in summer was at least three times higher than in winter. People enjoy bringing their dogs to the canyon, particularly on odd-numbered days when dogs are allowed off-leash: roughly 15% of visitors on odd-numbered days had dogs accompany them. Cycling and walking on the road are also popular activities. During the summer observation period, an average of 18 cyclists per hour and six pedestrians per hour traveled uphill past the Fee Booth. Many of these road users are not going to a specific activity center in the canyon – cycling and walking is the activity and the canyon is the destination.

Public parking is available at trailheads, picnic areas, and areas with wide road shoulder or pullouts. There is private parking areas associated with Mill Creek Inn, Log Haven, Camp Tracy, and the cabin areas at Porter Fork and The Firs. Some of the developed sites have paved parking areas with delineated spaces, and there are numerous unpaved parking areas. Key parking problems in Mill Creek Canyon include:

• Trailheads that are in high demand quickly reach capacity, while parking supply in other areas is under-utilized;
• Drivers park illegally when they are unable to find a legitimate parking space, leading to congestion on the roadway; and
• Trail users must often park at overflow lots and walk on the roadway to trailheads, sharing the pavement with vehicles traveling in both directions, leading to a diminished canyon experience for these users.

To address these primary issues in the Canyon, the project team explored a variety of concepts, grouped into three categories:

• Parking management concepts
• Transit concepts
• Bicycle and pedestrian concepts

Parking management concepts evaluated for Mill Creek Canyon fall into two categories: systems that provide information about parking to users, and systems that change how parking is priced and managed. Parking management concepts included Dynamic Message Signs (DMS), staff-based systems, web-based systems, toll increases, paid parking, automobile restrictions, or reservation systems.

Transit concepts should address parking congestion at key areas in Mill Creek Canyon, and accommodate a range of users and their gear: dogs, bikes, picnic hampers, skis, snowshoes, and other accessories. The transit concepts are categorized into rubber-tire shuttle buses, and cable-propelled technology. Shuttle bus concepts included a winter shuttle, connecting riders from the 3900 South park-and-ride to the Winter Gate; a summer all-canyon shuttle, connecting riders from the 3900 South park-and-ride to the Big Water trailhead; a summer upper-canyon shuttle, connecting riders from the Terraces Roadside parking lot to the Big Water trailhead; and a cable-propelled transit system, connecting riders from the 3900 South park-and-ride to the Big Water trailhead.

Mill Creek Canyon is a popular destination for cyclists. The length and grade of the corridor offer an obtainable challenge, and traffic volumes are lower than in adjacent canyons. Strategies for improving cycling conditions in Mill Creek Canyon included an uphill bike lane, downhill shared lane markings, and bicycle amenities such as bike racks and bicycle-specific roadside signage.

Pedestrian strategies are focused on improving safety by reducing conflicts with vehicles, either by slowing vehicles or by removing pedestrians from the roadway. Pedestrian concepts included off-street trail improvements at the Winter Gate, Big Water trailhead, and Church Fork trailhead, as well as traffic calming strategies at major pedestrian activity areas like the Boy Scouts’ Camp Tracy property, Mill Creek Inn, and Log Haven.

The Project Team went through a multi-tiered process for screening and selecting concepts. This included multiple rounds of discussion and refinement with the Steering Committee. The Project Team presented these concepts to the stakeholders in a March 2012. This was followed by an April 2012 public open house. Following these rounds of screening, the Project Team further refined the concepts to create groups of recommendations for parking, transit, and bicycle and pedestrian improvements. Table ES-1 below outlines these recommendations and cost estimates.

Table ES.1: Summary of Recommendations