Effects of Roads on Heritage and Cultural Values

In addition to satisfying the American penchant for sightseeing by car and other forms of recreation requiring auto travel, roads and their features themselves sometimes have heritage value because of historic significance or architectural features. Roads also may affect areas considered sacred by American Indians or other religious groups. These issues can affect the legal and political framework for Forest Service road policy and management because important historical, social, and cultural values are often part of developing, maintaining, or decommissioning roads. Forest planning for transportation and for individual roads should incorporate information on heritage and cultural values for both roaded and unroaded areas.

Cultural Value of Roads

Roads and associated features are part of the history of the nation. Some features are significant for their association with exploration and settlement, others for accomplishments in engineering, and still others for reasons of local history and culture. Roads and other transportation features figured prominently in the early nonindigenous settlement and development of the nation. Roads that were or are significant in this way include early Spanish roads, such as El Camino Real (the Royal Highway) in California and New Mexico; those that follow the routes of American Indian trails (Davis 1961); military roads such as Cooks trail, which crosses the forests of northern Arizona (Scott 1974); and some early routes established for commerce, such as the Santa Fe Trail, which crosses the Cibola National Forest. Given their historical role, such roads (many still in use) often are eligible for the National Register of Historic Places. Of equal importance, historic roads often have special meaning to people who live near them or have used them. Route 66, for example, which crosses the Kaibab National Forest, is considered historically valuable for its role in establishing regular, all-season east-west automobile transportation to California (Cleeland 1988, Cleeland 1993).

Features forming part of or associated with a road may be historically or culturally valuable for their own merits (Fraser 1987). Bridges and other features built by the Civilian Conservation Corps often are fine examples of engineering and considered eligible for the National Register of Historic Places (Throop 1979). Many such bridges are on Forest Service roads. Roads also may have heritage value as part of a cultural landscape, such as the landscapes associated with homesteading, ranching, or logging. Even roadside advertising can have local cultural significance, such as the hand-painted message along an abandoned highway in the Cibola National Forest that claims "Curandera cures all." The National Park Service and the U.S. Committee of the International Council on Monuments and Sites recognized the heritage value of transportation corridors in a conference held in 1993 (USDI 1993).

Effects of Roads on Cultural Sites

Building, maintaining, and decommissioning roads can affect historical and cultural values. Roads often directly affect historical and archaeological sites. Building, maintaining, or decommissioning roads can damage or destroy archaeological sites (Spoerl 1988) with earthmoving equipment used on buried and surface remains, such as structures and other cultural materials. Roads also affect sites indirectly by increasing erosion or by making sites accessible to vandals. Less tangibly, but no less important, roads often affect areas that American Indians consider sacred, may limit their ability to conduct ceremonies that require privacy, and may even diminish the sacred qualities of such places.