In 1998, Juneau-Douglas High School senior Corey McKrill was searching for a community service project to earn his Eagle Scout badge. With guidance from Trail Mix, a blueprint from the Forest Service and permission from the airport, he and his fellow Troop 6 scouts devoted three summer weekends to construction. With help from his father Mike McKrill and others, Corey built an enduring gift to Airport Dike Trail users: a covered bench about three-fourths of a mile from the trailhead.

Today Corey’s bench offers a resting spot for people to watch birds while looking over the wide expanse of the Mendenhall Wetlands State Game Refuge. Forested islands dot the view. They were formed in 1959-1960 during an unsuccessful attempt to create a navigable channel between downtown and Auke Bay. Unfortunately, the dredged passage filled with silt from rivers and glaciers, making a deepened waterway too expensive to maintain. Left untouched and higher than the surrounding terrain, the sandy dredge piles became islands of spruce trees above saltwater tidal zones.

On sunny days the trailhead parking lot at the end of Radcliffe Road is filled with vehicles. The trail is popular for many reasons. It is flat and level. The wide trail traverses short corridors of evergreens and cottonwoods, offering protection from strong southeasterly wind and rain on stormy days. In other places the trail reveals open landscapes lined with five-foot-tall pink fireweed flowers in summer, patches of wild roses and interesting mushrooms. It is easily accessible for all users and is centrally located adjacent to Juneau International Airport. Rarely do bears or porcupines appear, which makes it a favorable spot for dog walkers and families with small children.

While hikers appreciate the wide, flat occasionally-snow plowed trail, it is technically the airport’s Emergency Vehicle Access Road (“EVAR”), a name bestowed many years after the common name of the dike trail. Firefighters from the nearby Glacier Fire Station regularly practice driving the big lime green Aircraft Rescue and Firefighting (“ARFF”) truck on the EVAR so they are prepared to act rapidly in case of an emergency. The vehicle requires unimpeded access to areas outside the fenced airport perimeter. The trail is on airport property.

The common name comes from the actual origin of the trail: it is a dike designed to contain water for floatplanes which tie up to individual docks on the shore of the seaplane basin. An aerial photo from about 1956 reveals the 20-year-old airport — and the skinny dike — which was pumped from wetlands used initially for dairy cows. The basin and channel were dredged for fill material to build up the land for the runway, while simultaneously providing a pond for floatplanes to land and be serviced at the airfield.

Juneau’s mountainous terrain offered few locations for safe airplane operations as the new mode of transportation was growing in the 1930s. Expansion was rapid once World War II demanded landing fields and military sites followed by post-war needs of civil aviation.

Over the decades the airport expanded to accommodate larger aircraft and provide more airfield services. Propeller planes were replaced by jets needing a longer runway. Security regulations made fencing necessary. Lighting on multiple low towers guides planes to the runway.

Perhaps the biggest threat to airport dike trail users occurred immediately after the Sept. 11, 2001, terrorist attacks on New York City’s World Trade Center and other locations that killed nearly 3,000 people. That event grounded American aviation suddenly. Vulnerability of airports shifted the nation’s focus. The Transportation Security Administration was signed into law two months later.

In Juneau, the 9-11 tragedy threatened the existence of the dike trail as a public access trail. Longtime users stepped up and gathered more than 1,000 petition signatures in defense of continued public access. Supporters pledged to provide watchful citizen security that would notify the airport of anomalies in behavior or other threats. The public partnership continues today along with Juneau Police Department and airport staff patrols.

The airport dike trail is a favorite location for dog walking, plane spotting and birdwatching. As one of the few open grasslands on the North American western coastal flyway, the refuge provides essential food and resting places for migrating birds. During spring migration the Juneau Audubon Society offers free bird identification walks on the trail and other locations in April. An elementary school program called SeaWeek, started in the 1970s and supported by NOAA grants and volunteers, takes students on the trail in May for onsite outdoor education sessions. The Alaska Department of Fish and Game posts illustrated informational signs seasonally beside the trail.

Recently birders have been focusing their cameras on owls, a favorite winter species. Sightings of tiny seven-inch-tall pygmy owls clutching fat rodents in their talons have popped up on social media. During other seasons, short-eared owls can be seen swooping low over the wetlands in search of voles. In 2001 a rare white snowy owl contrasted vividly against the dark green spruce forest. It was hundreds of miles away from its normal Arctic habitat.

Occasionally in a few winters, a great horned owl perched in trees above the trail, attracting photographers and hikers to stop and look up in the spruce boughs. Birder Patty Rose located a great horned owl once by honing in on the raucous calls of a pair of ravens. As she watched the resident ravens broke off twigs and tossed them at the threatening owl.

A dense woodland has grown between the floatplane basin and the refuge separating waterfowl from airplanes. The planes are a key attraction especially in busy summer months when helicopters fly in one pattern, jets in another and floatplanes fly parallel in carefully regulated airspace. Fencing separates people from the controlled airport space, but that was not always so. In early days people who grew up nearby recall as children ice skating on the frozen floatpond and riding bikes on pavement. In the 1980s hikers could drive around the unfenced runway and park beneath the trees.

Canine companions are popular trail users also. A good change occurred ironically as the number of dogs increased, yet the dog droppings decreased. Peer pressure and publicly available poop bags and a nearby dumpster encouraged pet owners to clean up. Pet stores now carry bags, too. Unfortunately, not all dog owners abide by the courtesy of responsible trail use. Volunteers George Utermohle and Debbie Behr of Grateful Dogs of Juneau scoop poop regularly and restock the supply of excrement bags at the trailhead. For $10,000 annually, the city supplies bags for many trails. Volunteer groups like Grateful Dogs keep trailhead dispensers full.

“About 840 poop bags on average are used per day,” said Colby Shibler, landscape supervisor with CBJ Parks and Recreation Department.

The social aspects of the Airport Dike Trail came into sharp focus during the COVID-19 pandemic when people needed distance from each other. The trail width gives a safe space that allowed hikers to see uncovered faces and greet each other with smiles that were masked in grocery stores and other indoor spaces. The trail is wide enough that an intimate conversation occurs six feet apart under normal circumstances.

For some trail users, being outdoors is the biggest reward.

“This trail keeps me sane,” said Tori Best on Sunday, Feb. 16, as she and Tony Kalk pushed a stroller with their three-month-old daughter Cleo tucked inside. The trail had been snow plowed by the airport so walking and pushing the baby buggy on packed snow was easy. Kalk praised another aspect of the trail, “Sunshine. Most of Juneau’s trails are in the forest,” he said.

The trail is special for many regular hikers and one of them celebrated a recent holiday with others in mind. Just before Valentine’s Day, trail user Jerry Voss created a heart-shaped rose bouquet near the end of the trail where a fence prevents people from trespassing on secure airport property. His neighbor had received a delivery of accidentally frozen — and thus unusable — red roses at her flower shop. Rather than see them discarded, Voss got the owner’s permission to repurpose the flowers. With about 200 red roses, Voss made a heart-shaped valentine for hikers who reach the turn-around point 1.5 miles from the trailhead.

“Everybody loves it,” Voss said on Monday. “That’s what I did it for; to bring joy to the people who walk the trail.”

The Airport Dike Trail keeps many people sane, like Best said, year round regardless of weather, and a heart of roses temporarily awaits hikers at the end.

• Laurie Craig can be contacted via editor@juneauempire.com.