Helena trails to close while fuels reduction work is in progress
Edward F. O'Brien
The City of Helena next week begins a two-month long hazardous fuels reduction project.. That means portions of some local hiking trails will be temporarily closed.
The work to reduce flammable vegetation on Helena’s open lands starts Monday. The goal is to decrease the risk of large, destructive local wildfires.
Hand crews will thin forested areas in the western portion of Mount Helena City Park and then move on to the north face of Mount Ascension Natural Park.
Tree thinning begins next week at the Tubbs Trailhead. To maintain public safety, the City will temporarily close portions of Ambrose, Road-To-Mars, Diretissima and Prairie Trails.
This project is made possible through a nearly $300,000 Hazardous Fuels Reduction Grant administered by the Montana Department of Natural Resources and funded through the U.S. Forest Service.
State launches fire mitigation project dashboard
Victoria Traxler
Montanans can now see what wildfire mitigation project the state is working on in real-time.
The Montana Department of Natural Resources and Conservation this week launched their new Forestry and Fuels Project Tracker. It’s an interactive map displaying where the agency is performing tasks like prescribed burns or commercial logging and thinning.
The map shows projects under contract, in active treatment or completed since 2023.
It includes DNRC projects on state and privately-owned lands, as well as some co-managed projects on federal public lands. Montana recently announced a shared stewardship agreement with the US Forest Service to collaborate on wildfire treatment projects across 200,000 acres in northwest Montana.
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