{"id":44745,"date":"2021-09-13T16:26:00","date_gmt":"2021-09-13T22:26:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/how-one-el-paso-county-bike-crash-is-changing-access-to-14ers-in-rural-colorado\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T03:21:10","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T09:21:10","slug":"how-one-el-paso-county-bike-crash-is-changing-access-to-14ers-in-rural-colorado","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/how-one-el-paso-county-bike-crash-is-changing-access-to-14ers-in-rural-colorado\/","title":{"rendered":"How one El Paso County bike crash is changing access to 14ers in rural Colorado"},"content":{"rendered":"

The owner of the Trinchera Blanca Ranch in the San Luis Valley recently erected these \"No Trespassing\" signs on the trail accessing the summit of Mount Lindsey. The landowner pointed to a 2019 federal appeals court decision that raised concerns over liability should a hiker be injured on his property. (Provided by Colorado Fourteeners Initiative.)
The owner of the Trinchera Blanca Ranch in the San Luis Valley recently erected these \"No Trespassing\" signs on the trail accessing the summit of Mount Lindsey. The landowner pointed to a 2019 federal appeals court decision that raised concerns over liability should a hiker be injured on his property. (Provided by Colorado Fourteeners Initiative.)<\/span>Provided by Colorado Fourteeners Initiative<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>\n

The ramifications of a lawsuit that ended with the U.S. government paying an injured mountain biker several million dollars after a crash on a washed-out trail continue to challenge Colorado fourteener hikers.<\/p>\n

And more recreational pursuits could be impacted by the 2019 court decision as private landowners worry about lawsuits filed by people who traverse their land on foot, bike or boat.<\/p>\n

Trinchera Blanca Ranch, which is among the largest in Colorado at almost 180,000 acres, this month erected \u201cNo Trespassing\u201d signs on the trail to the popular Mount Lindsey, warning hikers that public access to the San Luis Valley peak is not permitted.<\/p>\n

The conservationist owner of Trinchera Blanca \u2013 billionaire financier Louis Bacon \u2013put up the signs after consulting with his attorneys about the implications of a 2019 federal court decision that upheld a $7.3 million verdict awarded to a Colorado Springs mountain biker who crashed in a sinkhole on a washed out trail at the U.S. Air Force Academy.<\/p>\n

The ranch closed private sections of the trail up Mount Lindsey \u201cas a result of a recent ruling out of the 10th Circuit U.S. Court of Appeals, which limited the scope of the Colorado recreational use statute and increased landowner exposure,\u201d Trinchera Blanca spokesman Cody Wertz said.<\/p>\n

Earlier this year, that 2019 decision prodded John Reiber, the owner of mining claims all over Mount Lincoln, Mount Democrat and Mount Bross, to close access to fourteeners on his land. Access to the peaks was restored last month, after the Colorado Fourteeners Initiative and the Colorado Mountain Club worked with Reiber, putting up new signs urging hikers to stick to the trail and to stay out of privately owned mining structures.<\/p>\n

\"The
The ascent to the summit of Mount Lindsey is a difficult scramble on private property owned by Trinchera Blanca Ranch. The ranch owner has erected \u201cNo Trespassing\u201d signs on the trail to the summit block, citing increased liability exposure following a federal court ruling in 2019. (Lloyd Athearn\/Special to The Colorado Sun)<\/span>Lloyd Athearn\/Special to The Colorado Sun<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

Negotiations with the Trinchera Blanca Ranch \u201care going to be a longer process,\u201d said Lloyd Athearn, the head of the Colorado Fourteeners Initiative, which itself owns private property atop Mount Shavano and worked with its lawyers to craft signs warning hikers of some, but not all, known hazards on that peak. \u201cI think their concerns might be more involved.\u201d<\/p>\n

There are at least eight peaks in Colorado where hikers traverse private land to reach summits above 14,000 feet. For years the Colorado Recreational Use Statute \u2013 or CRUS \u2013 has protected those landowners, granting them immunity from lawsuits if they allow people to recreate on their land for free. The statute has exceptions though, if injured parties can prove a landowner willfully failed to warn or guard recreational visitors about \u201ca known dangerous condition \u2026 likely to cause harm.\u201d<\/p>\n

The 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals ultimately ruled that the Air Force Academy knew about a washed-out section of the paved bike trail on its property but failed to give proper warning.<\/p>\n

Jim Nelson, an engineer living in Colorado Springs, went for a bike ride on Sept. 3, 2008. In a shady section of trail on Air Force Academy property, Nelson pedaled into a damaged part of the trail and suffered serious injuries, including brain damage. Less than two weeks earlier a federal biologist stationed at the academy had taken pictures of the washed-out trail as part of a project to document erosion issues around the academy.<\/p>\n

\u201cHad something been done to warn or guard against people riding their bicycles on this designated bike path, Jim\u2019s injuries could have been prevented,\u201d said Nelson\u2019s attorney, David Hersh, with the Burg Simpson law firm.<\/p>\n

The appeals court actually affirmed the Colorado Recreational Use Statute protection for landowners, Hersh said, giving them immunity from liability lawsuits, \u201cunless they act willfully in failing to guard or warn of known dangerous conditions that are likely to cause harm.\u201d The legislature, when it crafted the recreational use law, \u201ccreated a very narrow, high burden on the exception,\u201d Hersh said.<\/p>\n

\u201cFrom my perspective as a trial lawyer, responsible landowners really should have no fear of the 10th Circuit\u2019s plain reading of CRUS and this \u2018willful\u2019 exception to the otherwise blanket immunity landowners enjoy,\u201d Hersh said in an email. \u201cLandowners have nearly complete immunity. The exception bar is quite high, in my estimation, and will be very difficult for any claimant to address. A landowner who is concerned about steep cliffs near trails or extant mine works can easily warn, for example.\u201d<\/p>\n

Jim Moss, a Denver attorney who specializes in recreation legal issues, says the liability of landowners who open their land to recreational users \u201cis absolutely zilch.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cThe original Colorado Recreational Use Statute is solid as a rock,\u201d Moss said. \u201cThe only time that the Nelson case would apply to any other case would involve another mountain biker crashing at a federal military property.\u201d<\/p>\n

Still, Athearn is finding landowners wary about possible exposure to lawsuits by recreational users who venture into steep mountain trails or explore dangerous, abandoned mining structures.<\/p>\n

\"The
The summit of Mount Lindsey is inside the privately owned Trinchera Blanca Ranch in the San Luis Valley. (Lloyd Athearn, Special to The Colorado Sun)<\/span>Lloyd Athearn, Special to The Colorado Sun<\/span><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/p>

By warning visitors with signs that identify Trinchera Blanca Ranch as private property and anyone venturing onto private land as trespassing, the owner has more legal room to avoid lawsuits because trespassers have fewer rights when they get hurt.<\/p>\n

Trinchera Blanca Ranch is a preeminent model for wildfire and wildlife management, with one of the state\u2019s largest conservation easements protecting a vast swath of the property from any development. Bacon, the ranch\u2019s owner, is renowned as one of the country\u2019s top conservationists, locking up hundreds of thousands of acres in easements that prevent any roads or structures. Those conservation easements, however, do not allow public access.<\/p>\n

Wertz, the ranch spokesman, said the property\u2019s managers and owner \u201cplan to continue discussing the issue\u201d with trail user groups, including the Colorado Fourteeners Initiative.<\/p>\n

Athearn himself worked with attorneys in 2016 to limit the liability of the Colorado Fourteeners Initiative when it purchased land that hikers use to reach the summit of Mount Shavano, near Salida. One lawyer on the group\u2019s board agreed there was risk, but helped craft signs that warned hikers of hazards, including things like lightning, avalanches and rockfall. Another lawyer advised against buying the property, warning Athearn that an injured hiker could bankrupt the nonprofit trails group.<\/p>\n

\u201cDifferent landowners with different lawyers with different risk assessments will come to different conclusions,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

Athearn fears the impact of the Nelson decision could soon reach beyond land accessing fourteeners.<\/p>\n

Soon landowners with rock climbing crags, singletrack bike trails or navigable rapids could close access, he suggested. Athearn said a remedy may involve Colorado lawmakers going back into the Colorado Recreational Use Statute and adding more protections for landowners who open their land for recreational access.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere are all sorts of recreation features on private land,\u201d Athearn said. \u201cLegislatures across the country have said there is a public benefit to holding landowners harmless when they let the public recreate for free. How do we get back to where landowners are disincentivized from closing their land so they don\u2019t get sued?\u201d<\/p>\n

Read more at The Colorado Sun<\/div>\n

The Colorado Sun is a reader-supported, nonpartisan news organization dedicated to covering Colorado issues. To learn more, go to coloradosun.com.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Mount Lindsey in the San Luis Valley is the latest fourteener to shut down in the wake of a court decision that made the Air Force liable for injuries to a cyclist<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":44746,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[233,28,29],"naviga_topic":[],"class_list":["post-44745","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-coloradosun-com","tag-headlines","tag-newsletter"],"acf":[],"author_name":"Website Administrator","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44745","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=44745"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44745\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":86210,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/44745\/revisions\/86210"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/44746"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=44745"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=44745"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=44745"},{"taxonomy":"naviga_topic","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.durangoherald.com\/tj\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/naviga_topic?post=44745"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}