The city of Boulder has just gone “no excuses” on your next hiking outing. Or maybe, depending on what the live webcams show, they’ve actually provided you with the best excuse to stay home with your feet up.
Whether the parking lots are already full or the lightning is about to hit at your favorite Boulder trailhead is now an answerable question, before you leave the house or exit the turnpike. Boulder has launched livestreams from popular park trailheads like Flagstaff, Chautauqua, Wonderland Lake and Flatiron Vista. Just for fun, they’ve also thrown in a gorgeous view of the Flatirons from atop the Chautauqua Ranger Cottage.
More trailhead cameras at other parks will be added in coming months. While Boulder encourages everyone to recreate “responsibly,” regardless of camera presence, you just know what’s coming on the live screens: Romantic partners and expecting parents with a flair for the dramatic, go ahead and plan your online prom asks and gender reveals with a Boulder background.
Boulder County previously set up similar trailhead and parking lot cams at popular parks such as Carolyn Holmberg Preserve, Heil Valley Ranch and more.
City of Boulder open space spokesperson Phillip Yates said, “These cameras were installed with a focus on providing visitors with information about trailheads, for example, how crowded they are, current weather conditions.”
The city will also use information from the cameras to “understand parking utilization and visitor use as part of ongoing efforts to improve trailhead infrastructure,” Yates said.
The cameras are not monitored continuously by the city, though, Yates added.
Visitors worried about surveillance or pushing rule boundaries, though, should know that law enforcement could always be watching, either live or after the fact.
Video from the feeds is stored, though eventually overwritten with new images, Yates said. “All cameras have slightly different capabilities, so the recording duration varies for each one.”
City of Boulder Open Space and Mountain Parks Rangers and other law enforcement agencies “may retrieve footage from cameras located in public spaces” for investigations, Yates added. There is nothing written that prohibits “sharing video with law enforcement agencies upon request,” he said.