The Washington State Department of Fish and Wildlife is proposing to replace two pedestrian foot bridges near Trout Lodge Fish Hatchery along Rocky Ford Creek, in Grant County. The proposed undertaking required permitting from the Army Corp of Engineers, a federal agency; therefore, the potential impacts to cultural resources must be considered under Section 106 of the National Historic Preservation Act. To that end, the Washington State Department of Fish and Wildlife retained Plateau to conduct the cultural resource survey. The area of potential effect consists of two bridge sites, a proposed borrow area, a creek crossing, access routes, and staging locations.
Pre-field research identified 26 archaeological sites and 16 isolates within one mile of the project area. Of those, two archaeological sites would ultimately be found to fall within the Project Area itself.
Fishermen and trout were active as the archaeologists performed the pedestrian survey over the entire area of potential effect. Seventeen subsurface shovel probes were excavated. No new precontact or historic-era sites were observed during the pedestrian survey and subsurface investigations of the project area; however, aspects of two previously recorded sites were observed within the project area. Provided access through these sites is restricted to existing transportation routes and previously disturbed areas, with no alterations or construction within the sites, the construction of the north bridge, south bridge, and use of the borrow area will avoid direct impacts to the sites.
