NATIONAL PARK SERVICE Park and Recreation Structures

SEATS ALONG TRAILS affording hikers a place to rest after a particularly difficult climb or to contemplate a fine view or an object of interest are very properly of much more informal character than the seating provided where use is more concentrated, such as in the picnic or beach area. A trail seat, being often the solitary man made object within view, makes an extraordinary demand on the park planner for sympathetic treatment in design and execution. The appearance of belonging in its setting is the rightful claim of the trail seat, and to accomplish this is the difficult problem of the designer. If it is to be effectively naturalized, it must appear casual and unforced, free of the appearance of being too cunningly and elaborately devised. There must be no implication of Nature turned upside down, or inside out, into a very parody of itself, in order that the world and his wife may have quaint, if uncomfortable, seats on the aisle. If the term "naturalistic" implies imitation of Nature, then to contrive in the manner of Nature things which Nature itself did not attempt—and trail seats are examples of this—is not only a difficult but a far-fetched undertaking. Completely satisfying naturalistic seats may seem few and far between. Since they are outside the realm of formula, the measure of their success or failure must remain a matter of personal opinion altogether.

Natural objects or formations may be utilized, within the limits of reason, as resting places along the trail. Ledges of stone, boulders, or down logs, with slight adaptations, provide trailside seating without the introduction of foreign elements. Two stumps, or well-buried rocks or boulders, in suitable proximity, provide supports for split logs as a resting place. A huge fallen log is notched to provide seat and back. An ingenious collaboration with Nature almost invariably provokes more genuine acclaim than the more pretentious object of which man can claim sole authorship.

It is possible to incorporate directional signs with trailside seats to picturesque results. Examples at Deception Pass evidence this. A fork in a trail or a crossing of two trails is reason for both seat and sign. The close coupling of two facilities not unsuitably related is always to be recommended over two separate facilities, especially if these are minor items like seat and sign.

In some localities, due perhaps largely to climatic conditions, there is a tendency to expand the simple trailside seat, by the addition of a roof, into something closely approaching a minor shelter. For such elaborations of the trailside seat it is surely reasonable to recommend a quality in both design and execution consistent with the pretentiousness of the object. If this recommendation of a higher quality in pretentious trailside seats results in fewer of them, it is still a sound recommendation.

A TRAILSIDE SHELTER is normally of lesser size than the picnic shelter of the concentrated use area. Its purpose is to offer rest and shelter to those hiking or strolling a trail. Its location, like that of the trailside seat, may be determined by a desire to provide quiet seclusion in an especially beautiful spot or rest along a difficult stretch of trail. It may combine a place to rest with a fine view, which latter feature makes the trailside shelter close kin to the minor overlook and differentiation between them not always possible.

The trail shelter of long tradition is widely known as the Adirondack shelter and was probably first developed by the early hunters and trappers of that region. Originally it was built with three walls of logs and one side open to the weather. It could be heated by a campfire built in front of the open side. For the greatest benefit from the campfire and the utmost in protection from the weather, the true Adirondack shelter was very low in height, barely affording headroom at the open front. The roof overhung this open side somewhat and sloped toward the rear. The scant headroom that resulted was not inconvenient in the original use of this type of shelter—sleeping on evergreen boughs laid on the ground. In adapting the type to present day uses in parks, of which overnight shelter is but one, the roof is generally raised to give greater headroom throughout. The changed proportions often result in a loss of the snug compactness characteristic of the pioneer's Adirondack shelter. If the structure is located so as to "burrow" into a hillside, the illusion of a low building is in a measure maintained, but such a site will necessitate a change from log to stone construction, and this is quite as marked a departure from the typical as is the altered roof line.

As other regions have claimed the Adirondack shelter for their own and adapted it to other materials and climates, and individual needs and tastes, it has undergone great change. Some of the experiments are interesting and successful, some are not. Adaptation, no less than invention, calls for skill. The transplanted Adirondack shelter of logs and of stone is shown in variety in the illustrations that follow.

STRUCTURES FOR PUBLIC OBSERVATION eventuate largely from determination on the part of the hyper-view-conscious for something bigger and better and more distant in views than Nature unaided could provide. Although often erected solely for the use of the public, they occasionally undertake to do double duty by serving also as fire detection towers. Tower structures in which fire detection is the sole or dominant purpose are discussed under the classification "Fire Lookout Structures." The present discussion is concerned with overlooks for public observation in connection with which fire detection is not a part or is merely casual.

Between the grimly functional fire lookout and the utmost in aesthetic structural elevation contrived by the view-for-view's-sakers is greater distance than any park vista will ever provide. When it has been essayed to superimpose the too conscious aspirations of the aesthetic on the structurally sufficient skeleton of the fire detection tower, the literally "crowning" error in park development has been committed. Probably a frank rendering of either extreme, free of gesture toward the other, is better than any hybrid produced by crossing the two irreconcilables.

Examination of existing timber-framed trestle-type observation towers for aesthetic values will prove disheartening. In general, the oil derrick as their inspirational source is painfully undisguised. This conclusion cannot be held in disparagement of the designers if it be honestly admitted that they have valiantly sought to solve the unsolvable. There is such admirable show of there-is-no-such-word-as-can't in every new attempt! It seems heartless to venture a restraining word, but the accumulation in our parks of harrowing skeletons commemorative of past ill-advised best intentions in this direction admits no choice of action.

There are other than purely aesthetic reasons for discouraging the building of high wooden structures. It is very difficult, if not impossible, to fabricate a timber-braced structure with bolted or spiked joints that will hold up under the attack of the elements for any considerable length of time without constant maintenance. Immediately after construction the wood members shrink, and the joints loosen. Decay will proceed rapidly at the joints where water seeps in between the members and finally into the bolt and spike holes. The structure is weakened at its most vulnerable point. With the slightest loosening of the joints the tremendous wind pressures cause movements which increase the stresses in the entire structure. The safety of the public using the towers cannot be assured, since it depends entirely on inspections and maintenance that naturally cannot be assumed and guaranteed into the future.

Because the wood-framed lookout tower is so utterly unappealing, and so potentially a hazard, it is strange that but few stone observation structures have been built. These are not foredoomed to failure, aesthetic and structural, as is the open wooden tower, but on the contrary offer opportunity for picturesqueness, satisfying design, greater permanence, and less maintenance. Particularly does it appear that the possibilities for a stone tower of modest height springing from a rock-crowned summit have not been widely sensed, certainly not widely embraced.

A required elevated water supply tank will often furnish both excuse and means for an observation feature. The utilitarian water tower becomes a less disquieting element in the landscape, when its structural support is masked by an enclosing stone wall surmounted by a lookout platform.

It is held by many that the birth rate for towerlike observation structures in parks is currently too high, and that some measure of control should be instituted. A wise choice of location, duly considered for elevation, vistas, forest cover, and obstructions to view, will sometimes permit a less blatant facility for observation, without aspirations to become a tower of Babel, yet without loss of desired objectives. Wherever in parks of little modified natural character structural provision for the enjoyment of a view can be limited to something less than a skyline tower of great height, a sane concept of wilderness values is better served.

THE MODEST OVERLOOK STRUCTURE has been designed in many pleasing forms, examples of which are shown in variety by the photographs and drawings that follow. It will be found that the most admired have an ingratiating lack of pretentiousness. It must be admitted that some of these might as logically have been classified as shelters. Perhaps the reader will withhold censure of this straining in classification and wink at the subterfuge as pardonable in the circumstances. The "batting average" of observation structures in general with the overburden of high towers stands very much in need of the beneficial rating that modest overlooks suggestive of simple shelters can contribute.

There is widespread urge to adapt the picturesque blockhouse of the pioneer to useful purpose in parks. This early, usually square building, with second story overhanging for purposes of defense, marched with the frontier from the Atlantic seaboard across the continent to the Pacific slope. There are said to be remains of these outposts of empire in the Puget Sound country. Thus it is a traditional structure over a large part of the United States, and the disposition to recall its interesting silhouette and construction in natural preserves is understandable. When the adaptation is intelligently done, with real feeling for the materials and methods of the original, the reconstruction seems almost to point backward to a once virgin continent and somehow to symbolize and give promise of such regeneration of natural resources as it is hoped park planning can in time effect.

Although the blockhouse form has been the inspiration for administration and other buildings, it is especially adaptable as a vantage point for observation or overlook use, and to such purpose has been re-created in a number of park areas in recent years. Sometimes the lower story is built of stone, but the use of logs throughout, either round or squared, is more typical of the original structures. Some of the adaptations, even those rather freely made, are very appealing. Unfortunately, the defensive purpose of the early blockhouse necessitated very small openings, whereas something much more open is usually felt to be essential in an overlook. Hence, the problem of the designer is to achieve such a balance between tradition and new function that we are not immediately and violently conscious of compromise.

In a sense the emergence of a trail or road at any point well above the surrounding country or at an open prospect point is essentially an overlook. It may be developed only to the extent of widening the trail or roadway, clearing a "window" in the foliage, or constructing a guard rail. In its more elaborate phases it may call for extensive retaining walls, parking area, seats, roofed shelter, sometimes with fireplace. Where the view is distant and spectacular, and supervision permits, fixed telescopic equipment is installed. The observation station on the south rim of the Grand Canyon and the Sinnott Memorial overlooking Crater Lake are so equipped.

There are some who will claim that it is sometimes better to remove the trees that crown a high summit and are the very obstructions to view that make necessary the building of an observation structure of height. The bald crown of the eminence is held to be a lesser, certainly no greater, blemish than the construction rearing itself above trees. There are undoubtedly locations where this solution would be an acceptable alternative to a tower. But it can hardly be urged for universal application. Rather should it be given thoughtful consideration as a possibility, to be weighed in the light of characteristics of hill or mountain top contours, prevalence of forest cover, and interest value of the view.

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