Inmates improve trail access to the Devil's Punchbowl recreation site.
Inmates pooled efforts to remove an old port-a-potty and replace it with an updated model in 2007.
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IPF's work is distinctive in the variety of projects that it undertakes each year throughout the Independence Pass corridor. In addition to its ongoing work at the Top Cut, IPF takes responsibility for other projects on an as-needed basis. We work closely with the Aspen Ranger District of the U.S. Forest Service to identify needs and plan and manage projects.
IPF has planted more than 13,000 native trees, shrubs, wildflowers, and grasses, and coordinated the work of hundreds of volunteers on the Pass. An extraordinary 18,000 hours of labor has been contributed by volunteers ranging from Roaring Fork Valley school children to Buena Vista Correctional Facility inmates.
For many years, IPF has worked with the Colorado Department of Corrections, recruiting work crews from the Buena Vista Correctional Facility to assist with projects. The inmate workers, for  example, have been an enormous help in maintaining and improving trails throughout the corridor. In 2005, the Buena Vista work crew improved trails and reclaimed a number of "volunteer trails" around the Independence Ghost Town, Lost Man Loop, the Pass Summit, Weller, and the Grottoes. On the Lost Man Trail, the crew installed water bars and improved other drainage structures to reduce erosion.
In addition, the inmates built a split rail fence around the parking lot at the Lost Man Trailhead across the road from the Lost Man Campground. The fence is intended to help direct and limit hiker impacts in this area. In the Weller area, the work crew protected trees from beavers by wrapping them with wire fencing. At the Grottoes, the crew installed over 100 native plants around the abutments of a new bridge that the U.S. Forest Service built in the spring.
In 2007, inmates installed a picnic table at Independence Ghost Town.
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