January 2011

Manitou Incline Open House January 20th, 2011

Manitou Incline No Trespassing Sign

The long climb to legalizing hiking the Manitou Incline is taking another step on January 20. There will be an open house about the draft Manitou Incline management plan from 5 to 7 p.m. at Manitou City Hall, 606 Manitou Ave. Instead of a presentation, there will be stations that cover the various topics of the management plan.

I haven’t found info on what changes they’ve made to the draft Manitou Incline plan since it was presented in October. The 2 most unpopular rules were only allowing hiking from dawn to dusk and no dogs. Also those at the October meeting didn’t feel the plan really had any plan to address the parking issues.

I’ve been told that the main fundraising for money to repair and maintain the Manitou Incline will be done through the Incline Friends group. The Trails and Open Space Coalition is facilitating creating the Incline Friends. It is free to join the group. E-mail This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it
or call at 719-633-6884.

The friends group needs volunteer help in these areas:

  • Leadership and Coordination
  • Fundraising
  • Partnerships and sponsorships
  • Grantwriting
  • Education/Outreach
  • Volunteer coordination
  • Maintenance and Construction – physical labor on the Incline.

The open house tomorrow isn’t the final meeting. The recommended plan will also be presented at the public meetings of various appointed and elected bodies of Colorado Springs and Manitou Springs over the coming two months before it will hopefully be approved by the landowners later this spring. The other planned meetings are:

  • TOPS Working Committee: February 2, 7:30 a.m. Parks, Recreation and Cultural Services Department, 1401 Recreation Way
  • Parks and Recreation Advisory Board: February 10, 7:30 a.m. Parks, Recreation and Cultural Services Department, 1401 Recreation Way
  • Colorado Springs City Council: February 22, 1 p.m. Colorado Springs City Hall, 107 N. Nevada Avenue
  • Manitou Springs Planning Commission: March 9, 7 p.m. Manitou Springs City Hall, 606 Manitou Avenue
  • Manitou Springs City Council – TBA.
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Time to Hike the Manitou Incline

Hiking the Manitou Incline

The Manitou Incline is just under a mile but climbs 2,000 vertical feet. So how long does it take people to hike up it?

Times of under 20 minutes for world class athletes pass around the local hiking community and in news articles. I have some friends that can hike the Manitou Incline in the low 20 minutes. My best time over 10 years ago was 29 1/2 minutes. I’m much slower than that now.

Colorado Springs has many very fit athletes so there are plenty of people hiking the Manitou Incline in under 30 minutes but from what I’ve seen the average Incline hiker is making it to the top in 40 – 60 minutes. Many first timers and people from lower elevations are taking well over an hour.

The accepted spot to time yourself is from the bottom tie right above the Pikes Peak Cog Railway parking lot. Stop timing at the last tie at the top.

Don’t be fooled by these times. These times and the times people talk about are just for going up the Incline. There’s no way to magically end up back at the bottom so you need to factor coming back down into your hiking plans.

Although the rules for using the Incline stop short of prohibiting coming back down the Incline, they recommend one way up for safety. The most popular way and recommended way to get back down is to go to the left (when facing uphill) and then down the connector trail to the Barr Trail. Going this way down takes about 45-50 minutes at a quick walking pace with no stops.

There are a few places with Manitou Incline times listed. Pikes Peak Sports has a Manitou Incline honor roll. The Incline Club has more official times from when they used to “run” the Incline before the No Trespassing sign was put up in June of 2000 (scroll down page to see the times).

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