Few things in trail news irritated me as much as learning that the southern terminus of the Arizona Trail (AZT) was closed off for no good reason.
During the months running up to the 2020 election, the Trump administration decided to ramp up construction of its highly politicized border wall. This new phase put an 18- to 27-foot fence in the single place it was least needed — inside a national monument.
Not only did this wall construction physically eliminate AZT hikers’ ability to hike the southernmost two miles of this National Scenic Trail, but it erected an unnecessary barrier for nearby ecology. Northern Mexico and Southern Arizona’s Sky Islands are critical habitat for jaguars and ocelots. An impenetrable wall across the terrain would unnecessarily bifurcate these endangered animals’ migratory lands.
Moreover, Customs and Border Patrol (CBP) didn’t even need a physical barrier inside the 4,700 acre Colorado National Monument. They were already electronically monitoring the area through sensors. Building the wall through a historical site was just a ridiculous political power play.
Yet, the Trump administration still plowed ahead.
The 7,000+ public comments in opposition to the border wall proposal had no impact on the process. Ditto for the detailed reports and advocacy from the Arizona Trail Association. Even a ruling from the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals finding that it was illegal to divert Congressionally-appropriated military funds to build the border wall wasn’t able to stop the blight.
The only thing halting the ridiculous construction project was a change in our presidency. On January 20, 2021, President Joe Biden issued a Proclamation terminating the former administration’s declaration of a national emergency on the southern border.
Sadly, this policy reversal didn’t mean hikers could easily return to the AZT’s southern terminus. Thanks to the piles of abandoned construction materials left behind by contractors, open trenches in the ground, and unstable soils from dynamite blasting, the area was still closed to hikers throughout the remainder of 2021.
Finally though, the Arizona Trail’s southern terminus re-opened on December 31, 2021!!
It took nearly a year for it to happen, but it’s here. And so, I’ll be able to begin my NOBO hike this year at the stone boundary marker that sits at the U.S.-Mexico border.
My thru-hike will begin where historians believe Spaniards first crossed into (what is now) the United States. I will have the ability to walk in the historic steps of Francisco Vásquez de Coronado’s expedition on a route that’s nearly five centuries old!
Once I arrive in Coronado National Monument, I’ll be free to stand at the junction of four major biogeographic provinces: the Madrean region, the Sonoran desert, the Chihuahuan desert, and the Southern Rockies/Mogollon region, while breathing in the history of my surroundings.
I feel as if the re-opening of the AZT’s southern terminus is a sign. 2022 is my year to hike the Arizona Trail!