Los Alamos launch central trail hub for Pajarito Plateau outdoors

Finding the right trail around Los Alamos got simpler when Places & Spaces Los Alamos launched the Pajarito Trails Series website on April 12, giving residents and visitors one place to check trail links, events and news for hiking, biking, skiing and stewardship across the Pajarito Plateau.

The site is built around a practical problem that has long frustrated trail users in Los Alamos County, White Rock and the surrounding high country: the region’s trail network is split across six interconnected systems. Those include Los Alamos County, Los Alamos National Laboratory, Santa Fe National Forest, Bandelier National Monument, Valles Caldera National Preserve and Pajarito Mountain Ski Area. For people trying to figure out what is open, who manages a trail and where to find the latest details, the new portal aims to serve as a central starting point rather than another layer of information to sort through.

Pajarito Trails Series brings several tools into one place. The site includes a master calendar, event categories, direct links to organizers, a focused news feed, crowdsourced submission tools and map links to official trail maps. It also sorts activity into four categories: Adventure, Discovery, Stewardship and On-the-Trails. That structure gives the site a simple public face, but the more important function is utility. A public submission tool for events, stories, news and corrections also gives the community a way to help keep the information current.

The launch lands in a county where trails are not a niche amenity. Los Alamos County says its canyons and mesas are linked by more than 150 miles of developed trails, while the county’s Open Space System holds more than 5,000 acres of public land and nearly 60 miles of trail. County open space is open to non-motorized use only, including hiking, running, horseback riding and mountain biking. County planning also shows the trail system is part of a broader management effort, with the county continuing to coordinate through the East Jemez Resource Council and the Los Alamos National Laboratory Trails Working Group.

That coordination matters because the terrain itself is difficult to navigate without current information. Valles Caldera National Preserve covers nearly 89,000 acres, and the National Park Service says its trails and points of interest are largely unmarked. In nearby areas of the Jemez, the U.S. Forest Service also tracks conditions that can be affected by burn scars and deadfall. For visitors planning a day on the plateau, and for locals who use these trails for routine recreation, that makes a centralized update source more than a convenience.

The new hub also arrives alongside broader county planning. Los Alamos County released a Draft Open Space and Trails Management Plan for public review and comment on July 1, 2025, and county materials say the draft is meant to consolidate recommendations from earlier plans, including the 2013 Community Trail Plan, the 2015 Open Space Management Plan, the 2017 Bicycle Transportation Plan and a 2022 trailhead assessment. In a community where outdoor access is part of daily life and a draw for visitors, the new trail hub may help turn scattered information into a more usable system for both public use and local stewardship.