A pair of hikers traverse the trail New Hampshire’s Presidential Range Wednesday, July 27, 2016, on Mount Washington, N.H. AP file

People will have a chance to comment Tuesday on the future of one of New Hampshire’s most iconic locations, the summit of Mount Washington, not long after news has come out about a proposal to turn parked railcars into a seasonal hotel and restaurant near the summit along the Cog Railroad.

A public information session on a draft master plan for the summit including Mount Washington State Park will be held Tuesday, Aug. 23, at 10 a.m. in the Legislative Office Building. It comes one week before the deadline for written public comments, which must be submitted by Aug. 31.

The draft is short on specific recommendations about new or existing buildings, roads and usage of the mountain, but it notes “there will always be a physical limit to the number of people on the Summit at any given time.”

“The Auto Road and the Cog Railway should investigate ways to limit their visitors in order to contribute to the long-range success of the Mount Washington experience. Similarly, the Appalachian Mountain Club, N.H. State Parks, and the U.S. Forest Service should investigate ways to limit the number of hikers or associated impacts,” the draft reads.

Under state law the Mount Washington Commission, an 11-member board representing government, private and advocacy groups, must update the master plan for the state-owned summit every 10 years. The hearing, which follows a similar hearing in North Conway on Monday evening, is part of that process.

The most controversial change currently proposed for the summit is a plan by the Mount Washington Railway Company, which runs the Cog Railway, to park more than a dozen sleeper cars on a rail siding below the summit to create a hotel and restaurant from May to October. The cars would be parked at the bottom of the mountain the rest of the time.

In June, the Executive Council approved a memorandum of understanding for the idea between the state and the railroad company, but the project requires additional approvals from local and state boards that will take several years to complete. Thousands of people have signed an online petition opposing the idea.

A less visible improvement is a project underway to replace the sewage treatment tank and upgrade the seasonal water system to year-round. This includes installing two new 20,000-gallon water tanks adjacent to the Sherman Adams Building “to replace the deteriorating steel tanks currently located 300 yards down slope,” and replacing the sewage treatment plant with a larger plant “that will provide capacity for anticipated growth in the number of annual visitors over the next decade.”

The draft also takes note of the always contentious issue of finance.

“Mount Washington State Park is the only park that does not support the operations of the park system statewide. All revenue to the Park is deposited in the Mount Washington Fund to be used on the Summit. None … is used to support parks administration or support less iconic locations that cannot generate enough revenue to support themselves,” the draft says. “However, like Hampton Beach, the Park is an important revenue generator for private sector businesses.”

It goes on to say that businesses and organizations connected to the park, which it calls Summit Partners, “should consider how to support the Mount Washington State Park and understand that their interaction with the Park and with each other is not a zero-sum game.”

The Mast Plan draft can be seen online at www.nhstateparks.org.

David Brooks is a reporter and the writer of the sci/tech column Granite Geek and blog granitegeek.org, as well as moderator of Science Cafe Concord events. After obtaining a bachelor’s degree in mathematics he became a newspaperman, working in Virginia and Tennessee before spending 28 years at the Nashua Telegraph . He joined the Monitor in 2015.

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