Calvinheslop
Registered: December 2011
City/Town/Province: Zionsville
Posts: 1
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For my environmental project I built a footbridge over a small creek at the base of High King Hill, south of Yellowwood Lake in the Yellowwood State Forest in South-central Indiana. The span of the creek is 20ft. and the bridge is 26ft. long and 5ft. wide. Previously there was no official crossing. Hikers and other trail users were causing environmental damage. The planning and construction process took place over a six-month period. I planned and lead the project myself, with help of 17 volunteers, almost entirely youth from my community for a total of 203 volunteer hours.
The outdoors are very important to me. My love for wild places and the protection of the environment is largely what lead me to complete this project. For the past three summers I have volunteered with the Student Conservation Association in Virginia, California, and Alaska, gaining excellent experience and knowledge, as well as an increased love for the wilderness. I wanted to complete a project that would both leverage the skills I had gained from the SCA and benefit my community and environment. I contacted the Hoosier Hikers Council asking if they had any areas that would be suitable for a youth project. The Hoosier Hikers Council is an organization responsible for the maintenance and construction of most of the public trails in Indiana. Both the property manager of the Yellowwood State Forest and the chairman of the Hoosier Hikers Council told me that the construction of a bridge over Yellowwood creek was an essential project that desperately needed to be done. This was a project that allowed me to use my skills to benefit the environment and the community of outdoor enthusiasts.
The construction of this bridge was very beneficial to the environment and trail users. Through my experiences in the outdoors, in school, and doing trail work, I have come to understand that all ecosystems are connected through their watershed. The protection and preservation of watersheds is essential to the health of an ecosystem as well as maintaining its natural beauty. Before the construction of the bridge, trail users had to find their own way across the creek. These methods, while creative, posed an environmental problem for both the watershed and the ecosystem. Often users would move fallen logs from their natural area to provide a crossing. Also stones had been frequently arranged in a way to create stepping-stones. In addition, the repeated foot traffic on the bank had eroded it to the point of altering the natural flow of the creek. This traffic caused erosion, increasing the sediment content of the creek, especially in areas of bank collapse. Increased sediment, one of the biggest polluters of waterways, can be devastating to already delicate wildlife. All of these seemingly small impacts have a magnified effect on the creek downstream.
Recruiting a large number of youths interested in giving back to their community has exponential benefits in the future. Volunteers see that they can make a difference in their environment and hopefully it will inspire future actions. In addition to the 17 people who worked on my project, countless people are given a more pleasant, safer, and lower impact experience in the outdoors and this will hopefully create an even more environmentally conscious and proactive group of people. It is the individuals who benefit from the project as well as the direct environmental good caused by the bridge that make this project extremely rewarding.
The bridge consists of three 26ft. supports running parallel to each other, called stringers. Each of these was made from three 2x12x16s that are overlapping and bolted to each other with carriage bolts. Twenty-five 1x6x5s were fastened on top of the three stringers as treads. The method that I used to secure the bridge to the ground was specified by the Hoosier Hikers Council, driving 6 foot, heavy-duty U steel fence posts about 3-4 feet into the ground and bolting the bridge to them. This method has been tried and tested over the years and is a key aspect of the bridge. The fastening system is specifically designed to break in high water. This not only protects the bridge from damage but also prevents debris from damming up behind the bridge causing potentially catastrophic flooding and damage. Because the project site was about a 70 min. drive away from my hometown, we had the bridge measured, cut, and marked for building prior to the day of construction. On construction day, we transported the materials to the bridge area by an access road and carried them the rest of the way to the bridge site. First, we constructed the three main stringers from their individual parts. Next, we moved the stringers over the span of the creek and created the basic bridge shape, as seen in figure 1. After this was completed the treads were screwed to the base and cleanup began. Jim Allen, the Property Manager of the Yellow Wood State Forest, donated all of the materials. A table showing the budget and volunteer hours are included below.
Item Cost
9- 2x12x16 treated lumber $179.28
2- 6x6x10 treated lumber $59.94
27- 4/5x6x10 treated lumber $161.19
48- 5/8x4 carriage bolts $60.00
16- 5/8x3 lag bolts $29.92
48- 5/8” flat washers (one box of 50) $17.00
48- 5/8” lock washers (one box of 50) $11.50
48- 5/8” nuts (0ne box of 50) $11.00
350- 2 ½” galvanized deck screws (one 5 lb box and two 1lb boxes) $41.42
8- Heavy duty steel U posts $39.60
16- 5/16x3 ½ lag bolts $5.60
16- 5/16 flat washers $.80
14- 2x10 heavy joist hangers $73.22
Total: $690.47
Name Youth Adult Date
(mm/dd/yy) No. of Hours
Susan Mittenthal X 1-23-11 4
Brent Heslop X 1-23-11 8
Peter Banta X 1-23-11 4
Brent Heslop X 3-18-11 2
Brent Heslop X 4-9-11 4
Brent Heslop X 4-16-11 8
Tanner Heslop X 4-16-11 4.5
India Knapke X 4-17-11 .5
Christian Simon X 4-17-11 1
Spencer Bellefuil X 4-17-11 2.5
Aaron Griswald X 4-17-11 4
Matt Phillips X 4-17-11 4.5
Derek Salge X 4-17-11 4
Tanner Heslop X 4-17-11 3
Brent Heslop X 4-17-11 7
Laura Heslop X 4-17-11 1
Brent Heslop X 4-30-11 1
Laura Heslop X 4-30-11 1
Jake Johnson X 4-30-11 1
Aaron Griswald X 4-30-11 1
Brent Heslop X 4-31-11 8
Laura Heslop X 4-31-11 8
Tanner Heslop X 4-31-11 8
Tanner Thompson X 4-31-11 8
Aaron Griswald X 4-31-11 8
Jake Johnson X 4-31-11 8
Derek Salge X 4-31-11 8
Don Thompson X 4-31-11 8
Sarah Thompson X 4-31-11 8
Chris Thompson X 4-31-11 8
Susan Mittenthal X 4-31-11 6
Stuart Heslop X 4-31-11 8
TOTALS 12 5 144
Total number of hours others worked on the project: ____144______
For a grand total, add the total number of hours you spent on the project to the total number of hours others worked on the project: ____203_______
Figure 1
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