Might have something you can borrow (or buy really cheap) if you haven’t already found something. I’ve left you a voice mail with my contact.

A 38 year old retaining wall. Installed entirely on one cold wet rainy day by CSS members on the last Saturday of Oct 1983.

The 1979 Nationals were held at Crestline and it caused safety concerns due to the extreme congestion on this 2 lane narrow road and no shoulders to park on. So the following year the CSS requested permission to create a 20 vehicle parking lot. By 1981 the Forest Service opened it up to bids to improve the site and regulate the flight activities. The CSS was one of 3 bidders.

In 1982 the CSS won the bid and received the permit.

The permit required excavating to make a wide shoulder on the south side to create the parking lot and build the retaining wall. By summer 1982 the excavation was complete but funds didn’t yet exist to create the wall. So as a temporary way to prevent driving onto launch, a chain link fence was installed full length from the outhouse to the downhill end of the dirt parking lot. The remains of that fence still encircle the outhouse.

By late 1983 the Forest Service was getting impatient with the CSS delays in installing the retaining wall. They said that the permit would be revoked if not completed by end of Oct.

With procrastination as an operating procedure, a work party date to hand dig, and pin together some 200 ties was set for the 29th.

The weather gods punished us with a cold windy rainy day. Some 25 brave pilots (most of the CSS membership) spent the day freezing. The central stairs were a design as we went process with half a dozen pilots making suggestions on the placement and choosing a best way to do it with minimal time wasted in the discussion due to the fact we were freezing. Get er done!

The Forest Service then gave us till end of 1984 to pave the lot. The expense would be 10 times the cost of the wall and roughly the equivalent of 8 years average CSS budget. And that, as they say, is another story.

The shade structure recently lost to a wind event lasted 25 years. It had an initial cost of a 3 or 4 $k. It required periodic maintenance in paint. A little bit of wood rot at the base of the support columns caused the complete loss. Mitigating the wood rot either by adding support straps going a few inches up each column to bite healthy wood or replacing columns every 10 years could have likely extended its life to 50 years or 100 years. This is all 20 20 hindsight.

For years we enjoyed the shade it provided. I don’t recall any recent discussions prior to the structure loss about a need to improve the amount of shade. We seemed quite content with its function.

I would hazard a guess that if we utilized the existing foundation that sits there with its proof of lasting a quarter century and was not culpable with respect to the loss of of the structure, and rebuild to similar strength with perhaps a better column base connection, the total materials might be well under 10K and built by members with 4 or 5 work parties spread across less than a month.

This is more historical. First photo on the day we first made the x. Note grass coverage.

https://www.dropbox.com/s/38d93z1swi48ukm/x.jpg?dl=0

Yes. What David said. It’s legal to fly from the local mountains through our local airspace. Part 103.

The LZ is however private property allowing public use based on specific regulations being followed. And it is in an almost identical situation as the Lake Silverwood State Recreation Area. Both are part of FERC Project P-2426  with the LZ created following the FERC amendment dated 7-23-1990 to that project. By luck and careful negotiating we don’t have state hired uniformed employees guarding the LZ with a gate that opens only on particular hours and days like at that recreation area. The state is trusting the CSS to do that for them. It is a win win for the pilots and the State of California. The state requires that the CSS provides insurance and the insurance company in turn requires certain regulations to be followed such as USHPA membership and pilots skills being evaluated, both of which the CSS is responsible to monitor.

It should be obvious that we all benefit by unifying and not scattering our landings in the adjacent flood control. But scattered landings are a minor risk when compared to Andy Jackson landings not meeting our insurance requirements.

The old expression applies regarding our LZ. It is ours, to lose.

I used to believe that the HG and PG pilot community was unstoppable and able to meet any challenges that the city, county, state or federal governments threw at us. We did indeed jump all those hurdles. You have no idea how proud I was of how we all pulled together to get the LZ.

I never imagined that the pilots would encore those successes by tripping over their own feet just trying to walk a straight line.

We lost Kenny in a single vehicle driving accident about 9 PM Oct 4th in the Lake Arrowhead area.

Dianne and I are heartbroken.

Keep the pics and memories coming.

We love you Meg.

I spoke with Mike Johnson this evening. Mike talked with kenny 4 days ago. Kenny was in good spirits and recently has been doing some powered flying while waiting for the forests to open back up.