Trail Markers: Identity and Utility along the Pacific Crest Trail

Abstract

The hiking trail is an essential element of landscape architecture that is positioned between the human and natural construct. This thesis proposes a series of built interventions along the Pacific Crest Trail that mediate between the natural and human infrastructure by creating an identity for the trail, protecting the natural landscape, and supporting its future use by hikers. The creation of a way station as a marked access point, a privy for waste disposal, and shelters dispersed along the trail work as a system providing utility and function for hikers.