Little Susitna access road needs upgrade, maintenance

With the recent downturn in wild king salmon production and the resulting emergency fishing regulations issued by the Alaska Department of Fish and Game (ADF&G) this year, the Little Susitna River is the only Mat-Su location where people can drive a highway vehicle and specifically harvest wild king salmon.

At least, since that is what the regulations specify, all Alaskans and nonresident visitors should have that opportunity. Over Memorial Day weekend, that opportunity was sorely lacking.

For readers unfamiliar with the short Little Susitna River Access Road, it is the only driving route to the Little Susitna River Public Use Facility campground and boat launch and the primary access to the lower 50 miles of the Little Su. Road maintenance on this four-mile road is divided between the state for the first section, the Mat-Su Borough for the middle section and the Alaska Department of Fish and Game for the final section. The borough and Fish and Game-maintained sections could easily be classified as primarily a dirt road with some gravel that has a low, poorly drained roadbed. Each spring and after any heavy rain event the middle and final road sections often turns soft and rutted. During and after spring breakup, the middle section is always the worse and the borough contractor often delays road maintenance until the roadbed dries out on this section of road.

With this year’s late spring breakup, the road remained wet and muddy in the middle section through Memorial Day Weekend. When road maintenance was requested on the road, the borough contractor did a wonderful job grading out the ruts and rough spots — except for the two worst mud/bog holes — where no maintenance was done. For all attempting to reach the state’s multi-million-dollar camping and boat launching facility at the end of the road, on what should have been the busiest holiday weekend of the entire summer, this was a major roadblock. Emergency fishing regulations that only allow Little Susitna River king salmon harvest on Saturday, Sunday and Monday of each week only compound that problem.

Before the weekend, the borough contractor had told the Alaska State Parks ranger, responsible for overseeing the campground/boat launch, that the road had been fixed, but somehow did not mention that no maintenance had been done to improve access past the two worst spots in the road. For all attempting to travel along the road this provided an unneeded and uncalled for surprise.

Having more than 30 years experience traveling over this road and knowing how hard it can be on vehicles, trailers and boats, I avoided all trips to Little Susitna River Public Use Facility until Memorial Day Weekend. After hearing the road had been “fixed,” I scheduled my first fishing charters to the river more or less prepared for the worst, towing my guide boat with a four-wheel-drive Suburban fully engaged before reaching the first mud hole. It looked bad enough that I approached with some momentum, bouncing the vehicle and trailer as the mud sucked at the tires and nearly brought us to a complete stop, but then with one last lurch the vehicle and trailer both made it through. With the underside now coated in mud, there was a distinct scraping and grinding sound as I drove toward the boat launch. I stopped and got out to inspect, but could find nothing I could fix at the time, so headed on for the boat launch.

King salmon fishing for my guests, aside from wildlife viewing during the trip, was uneventful as we did not get any bites. The two morning groups of guests both drove four-wheel-drive trucks all the way to the parking area, while both sets of afternoon guests parked their vehicles on the far side of the mud holes and started walking more than a mile to the river. One of the afternoon sets of guests was given a ride, without which I was told they would not have walked all the way to the river.

Because of better water conditions on the Little Susitna River, I had planned on guiding king salmon fishing trips at that location for the entire three-day weekend, but after traveling the road one time it was a no-brainer that I could not ask guests to drive through the mud holes to reach the river — besides which, I did not want to subject my own vehicle to such punishment.

There were very few campers at Little Susitna River Public Use Facility, some floaters drifting down the river from Houston and only a relative few boat anglers (I did not see a single bank angler). It was low participation at least partly caused by poor road conditions. Alaska State Parks fee booth attendants scheduled to work on Saturday were not present because they wisely chose not to drive their own vehicles through the bad spots. Towing my boat on the way home I could see that even the relatively small amount of daily traffic had worsened the mud holes. One vehicle/boat trailer that had been stuck was pulled forward through the second mud hole, while the boat trailer was pulled backward to dry ground between the two mud holes. On the far side of both mud holes vehicles were parked in a line beside the road.

In an effort to ensure I made it through without getting stuck on the trip home, I stopped the Suburban and got out to carefully select the best route before driving through. The owners of the stranded boat trailer asked if I made it through, would I come back and get their boat and trailer. I had no immediate response. Using a carefully chosen route, I still bottomed out my vehicle in the holes and once again nearly came to a halt before finally lurching through the last sucking section of mud. With a second coating of heavy mud, both the Suburban and trailer were scraping and sounding worse than ever. Scraping bottom through the hole had torn the trailer light assembly partly loose from the vehicle and the trailer lights no longer worked. At this point I told the people with the stranded trailer and boat, that I would give them a ride or let them use my cellphone, but I was not going to risk getting stuck or more damage to my vehicle.

I’ve been working out of Little Susitna Public Use Facility for close to 30 years, and during that time the middle and last sections of Little Susitna River Access Road have always had these problems. The river on the lower end is one of the most heavily used fishing, boating, camping, hunting access sites in the borough. What good are the expensive handicap-accessible fishing platforms at this site if people cannot get to the river in the first place? How long will it take before the public can get a reasonable access road to this facility and the Susitna Flats Sate Game Refuge where it resides?

Andy Couch owns and operates Fishtale River Guides (fish4salmon.com) and is a member of the Mat-Su Borough Fish and Wildlife Commission.