Sledding hill closures leave Valley parents wondering where to go

After the largest early December snowfall in recent memory, some residents packed up their children and sleds this week to hit a pair of popular local sledding hills, only to find them blocked-off or guarded by “no sledding” signs.

A newly constructed series of fencing at a slope next to the water tower on Trunk Road has closed off most of that sledding area. And a popular sledding hill next to the chalet at Government Peak Recreation Area is now bordered by orange borough signs reading “absolutely no sledding” in all capital letters.

The land managers who oversee those areas said they have barred their use to lower liability created by any potential injuries.

“‘No sledding’ signs have been put up annually at Government Peak as the runout isn’t long enough and there is a risk of people hitting the trees at the bottom causing injury,” Hugh Leslie, the Borough’s recreation services manager said in an email.

The land adjacent to the Trunk Road water tower is shared by the City of Palmer, which manages the water tower, and state university system via the Mat-Su College.

Early this year the college fenced off and planted trees on the portion owned by the system to block sledding and other unmonitored use, said Talis Colberg, Mat-Su College campus director.

“We don’t want to be in the sledding business, we’ve never been in the sledding business,” he said. “No one here dislikes sledding — I don’t have a staff to go watch the hill. I’m not eager to tell kids what they can and can’t do. Our responsibility is to protect the university from liability.”

Colberg said since a sledder’s death at an unofficial sledding hill on university property in Fairbanks many years ago, system officials have become very cautious about allowing unsupervised recreation on their property.

But the five acres of the Trunk sledding hill owned by Palmer remains unfenced — and unregulated. Palmer officials have no plans to change that, said Jude Bilafer, the city’s director of public works. He said they discouraged the college from installing the fences, asking them to instead keep the area open to use.

“We are going to have signs made up that says ‘fencing brought to you courtesy of Mat-Su College,” he said “We went round and round and said fencing this is a really stupid idea. It was ludicrous their rationale for fencing it, from our perspective.”

Instead, he said the city still actively encourages residents to keep sledding on their slice of that land.

“The city has absolutely no plans whatsoever to stop people sledding on their portion of the water tower,” he said. “We want people to go sledding there, it’s a great place to go.”

As for other sledding hills, they can be hard to access — like the hill at Independence Mine in Hatcher Pass — or seem dangerous. Borough officials said their only designated maintained sledding hill is at Crevasse Moraine. Steep and often very icy, the hill is infamous among local parents for causing injuries. But likely because the washout is free of trees and cars, no sledding-related deaths have been reported there.

Bilafer, who previously led capital projects for the Borough, said in his view the Government Peak Recreation unofficial sledding hill is truly an ideal location. He said he doesn’t know of any injuries occurring on that hill. While the bottom is free of trees before the berm, it’s possible for very fast sledders on an ice crust to shoot above the berm and into the trees below.

“It was a fabulous hill, and then we had some complaints that some kids were sledding too fast,” he said. “In the years I worked at the Borough I was not aware of a single incident — that’s not to say there wasn’t any — but I was not aware of it. But I have heard many broken bone stories from Crevasse Moraine.”

At the Borough, Leslie said he’s explored altering the Government Peak hill so it can open it to sledding, but lacks the funding.

“I have recommended reconfiguring the hill as a potential solution, but monies are not currently available,” he said.