[pct-l] Bear Canister "required" areas on PCT in the Sierra...

[enyapjr at comcast.net]

"Home"/Jeffrey said and asked: "So the trail needs more bear boxes.  What's involved in buying and installing them?"

Ahhh...  Sounds so simple - but do you/we really want that?  It's something everyone should seriously ponder...
Do we want as much "wilderness" trail as possible on the PCT - or not?
Do we want to 'soften' or 'civilize' what wilderness the PCT now traverses - or try to keep it as 'wild' as possible?

Yosemite has already phased out the backcountry "bear cables" - they were 'unnatural' eyesores that didn't fit into the "wilderness" definition...  The only backcountry bear boxes in Yosemite are located at the High Sierra Camps - which really don't fit into the "wilderness" definition, either, but are 'grandfathered' in via tradition/long standing usage...
The backcountry/wilderness bear boxes in Seki don't fit the "wilderness" definition, either, and that is why they will eventually be phased out - so the wilderness can be more 'wild'...

Seki NP and Inyo NF have changed over the last few years; 'normal' backpackers must have bear canisters on certain trails and in the restricted areas - unless you agree to that, you won't get a permit...  Agree to it and get caught without a canister - big, big fine and you get to leave immediately...
Just another reason why I believe the eventual discontinuance of the bear boxes is 'in sight'...  If most of the backcountry bear boxes along the PCT wind up being for thru-hikers only, the thru community is too small a %age of backcountry users to be given 'special' treatment for very long - then we'll have to 'tough it out' and carry bear canisters like all the 'normal' backpackers...

Think about it...  Sorry, but I don't see more bear boxes as being a 'solution'...

Of course, YMMV...  ;-)    Happy trails!!!
Jim Payne

"I speak the truth not so much as I would, but as much as I dare, and I dare a little more as I grow older."  
- Michel de Montaigne

"There is no conversation more boring than the one where everybody agrees." - Michel de Montaigne