Paul Koski moved to Nucla in 1979. He arrived before a lot of things: way before the Nucla Station, the local power plant, closed down in 2019; way before the nearby New Horizon Mine ceased coal production in 2017; and even before Uravan, a mining town about 20 minutes away, was demolished and buried by the Environmental Protection Agency in 1986.
But even before that was the summer of 1966, when Koski, then 15, and his older brother biked from Mountain View, Calif., to Ithaca, NY, in only 26 riding days.
“We were kids, you know,” Koski said. “We wanted to just do something.”
They averaged 114 miles a day.
Koski is still biking these days, though he switched to an electric bike two years ago.
He previously operated a woodshop in the West End, Koski Fine Woodworking, but ever since his retirement he has focused on biking, as well as his longtime passion of trail building. Koski is responsible for the West End’s Paradox Trail and has been a member of the West End Trail Alliance (WETA) board since it was formed in 2014.
WETA’s latest project is a trail network with two parts, the Naturita Trails system and the Sawtooth Trail system.
In 2021, WETA approached the Bureau of Land Management (BLM) with the proposal to build approximately 32 miles of new single-track trail on the Naturita and Sawtooth regions of public land. After an approval process that included an environmental assessment, archeological and biological studies, Koski and WETA’s Tim Tait said that they hope to receive the go-ahead to start construction in the early spring of 2027. The wait has had its exciting moments though.
“[The paleontologist] found a fossilized turtle, which I thought was interesting,” said Koski.
WETA hopes that the new trail system will bring in more biking visitors.
“We have a lot of through traffic, because we’re situated between Fruita, Grand Junction, Cortez, and then Telluride and Moab,” said Koski. “[We have] proximity to all of these very popular mountain biking areas.”
It will also benefit the local biking community, which is, in Tait’s words, small but well-connected.
“We have a lot of different types of cyclists: mountain bikers, adventure cyclists, gravel riders, and we’re all excited and eager to contribute to the building of the trail project,” said Tait.
Many of the current West End biking trails are double-track, often old mining roads, or county gravel roads, so the single-track will widen the selection.
“It kind of helps round out the different biking options we have in the area,” said Tait, adding that includes the 118-mile Paradox Trail, which traverses the Uncompahgre Plateau. “We’re really missing the purpose-built single-track right now.”
WETA is currently immersed in the funding process for the project, which will cost more than $1 million, according to Tait.
“Our focus grant right now is the CPW, Colorado Parks and Wildlife, nonmotorized trail grant for the fall,” said Tait, adding it will be submitted in early October.
Over the years, WETA has received various grants from the Telluride Foundation and the Colorado Tourism Office, among others, to carry out WETA’s mission and continue building trails.
Once funded, the upcoming work will be divided between a professional crew and volunteers.
“We have a solid volunteer base that’ll come out for different types of trail activities,” said Tait.
Those volunteers, who can number as many as 15, often work to build trails on Saturday mornings.
“Trail work is kind of addictive,” said Koski. “I like getting out and exercising, and it’s very creative … ”
In the meantime, the volunteers have already completed the Naturita Trails Connector, a single-track trail that will connect to the new trail network. It begins in Naturita at the old elementary school, across from Blondie’s Drive In. It hasn’t been connected to anything yet, but it’s a sign of progress.
“There are already bike tracks on it,” said Koski.
