Over and over again, we pick up the trash in an area during our Clean Sweep events, and we leave behind an abandoned vehicle, or an RV. Over time, the vehicle deteriorates, gets smashed, blown up, or is torched by people in the area. Not only is any abandoned vehicle or RV in the woods a fire hazard, it is a source of toxins, including antifreeze, motor oil, transmission oil, and other fluids; lead, mercury and other heavy metals; plastics, and more. The vehicles are hazards to wildlife, waterways, hikers/bikers/visitors, and air quality (when they are burned). There is a great article about the hazards of abandoned vehicles in the woods, here. Finally, a vehicle or RV sitting in a spot is a magnet for new encampments and new trash dumps, just like the trash heaps were – except we are picking up the trash heaps, even while we leave the vehicles behind.
We leave them behind because we are not allowed to remove them. For vehicles and RVs, there is paperwork that must be done. Local BLM staff are overcommitted and can not spend time and resources to do all the paperwork for all the vehicles, so the Clean Sweep is not allowed to remove them. Not to mention that it can be expensive to remove an RV – but we could probably round up the funding to pay for their removal, if we were allowed to do so – which we’re not. So they sit!
How could we make this better? Could there be less paperwork required, for vehicles that have obviously no value and have been abandoned on public lands? Could there be more funding sent to our local BLM office, so that they could do the paperwork for all the vehicles? Should we just encourage locals haul them off as they see fit and find ways to work outside the system? Right now, the system is broken and is not serving us. We’ll have to either ignore the system, or fix it, but we can’t just leave the vehicles and RVs out in the woods.
The Catalog*
* This only includes vehicles that the Clean Sweep’s organizers know of – which might be only a tiny fraction of what’s out there; we’ve heard that it might be upwards of 100+ cars & RVs!
- #1
- 42.21731, -123.61924
- 20 feet from Reeves Creek
- Huge 5th wheel RV; we cleaned up a ton of trash around this site of an old camp.
- #2
- 42.21897, -123.62175
- 30 feet from Reeves Creek
- 5th wheel RV with trash all around it.
- #3
- 42.21897, -123.62175
- 40 feet from Reeves Creek
- Medium sized motorhome, on it’s side
- #4
- 42.21897, -123.62175
- 30 feet from Reeves Creek
- Upside-down car on top of a heap of trash and RV pieces
- #5
- 42.20767, -123.62525
- 30 feet from a small seasonal tributary to Reeves Creek
- Upside-down car
- #6
- 42.20356, -123.62659
- About a mile up the gravel Reeves Creek Road
- 10′ down a steep ravine, over the side of the road
- #7
- 42.20395, -123.63366
- Blue Ford Explorer, abandoned in January 2026, on Road 3
- #8
- 42.20053, -123.62889
- About a mile up the gravel Reeves Creek Road
- Way down a steep ravine, over the side of the road
- Recently burned while it went down the ravine, and burned some woods with it.
- #9
- 42.2045, -123.61294
- Shell of a truck, up on a bank above the road, 2 miles up the gravel Reeves Creek Road
- #10
- 42.21009, -123.63187
- Kerby Mainline, at the end of Road 7.
- Just the chassis and the engine got left behind!
- #11
- 42.20807, -123.62842
- Kerby Mainline, Road 6
- Very burnt RV or van
- #12
- 42.20491, -123.58757
- About three miles up the gravel Reeves Creek Road
- This is a smashed up RV and chassis that look to have been there for a while
- #13
- 42.2356, -123.56222
- Car blocking a road near the bottom of McMullen Creek Road. Lots of small creeks feeding Lake Selmac right in this area.
- DONE!!
- #14
- 42.14185, -123.56103
- 20 feet from Bear Creek
- Right at the top of the Thompson Creek / Bear Creek Pass.
- I don’t even know what this is. One or two chassis with lots of metal stacked on top, maybe?
- DONE!!
- #15
- 42.27535, -123.49359
- About a mile up Cedar Ridge Road (off Deer Creek Road)
- Burned carcass of an RV
- DONE!!
- #16
- 42.11196, -123.51997
- 20 feet from Democrat Creek
- On 40-7-10 right off Tartar Gulch.
- This car went off the road in the steep ravine on Tartar, my son pulled it up for the guy, he left it, and somebody pushed it back down over the ravine. Then somebody towed it to 40-7-10, and later somebody lit some small bombs under it and blew it up a bit, leaving shrapnel all across the road. Now it’s in the middle of the road and we drive on the shoulder to get around it every time we drive up to our land. This particular car really chaps my hide!
- #17
- 42.11443, -123.52328
- This is a Dodge Durango, about a half mile up 40-7-10, right on top of the newly approved Roarick Mine. We hope that Larry Trefethen will properly dispose of this vehicle when he starts mining, rather than just moving it closer to the road.
- #18
- 42.11242, -123.52099
- 20 feet from Democrat Creek
- On 40-7-10 right off Tartar Gulch, down a mining road to the south.
- This is the top part of a white Chevy pickup. Somebody already took the chassis out from under it.
- #19
- 42.1109, -123.51812
- 40 feet from Tartar Gulch Creek
- This is a burnt, target-practiced car at the “shooting range” about 1.5 miles up Tartar Gulch.
- #20
- 42.09059, -123.6845
- Just south of Rough & Ready Creek
- This is the truck part. The engine has been removed and will need to be picked up separately!
- #21 & 22
- 42.32875, -123.59954
- Side road to the south of Onion Mountain Road
- A small burnt car stacked on a burnt RV chassis
- #23 & 24
- 42.32875, -123.59954
- Side road to the south of Onion Mountain Road
- A burnt car and a burnt pickup truck
- #25
- 42.06991, -123.6207
- Near Rockydale and Waldo, on E. side of Rockydale
- A HUGE boat on a trailer! It’s probably 8′ wide!
- #26
- 42.06991, -123.6207
- Near Rockydale and Waldo, in E. side of Rockydale
- Part of a car, anyway
- #27
- 42.13674, -123.46436
- Between Caves Highway and Tartar Gulch
- 20 feet above Sucker Creek
- Great big boat!
- #28
- 42.26409, -123.55421
- Bottom of Thompson Creek Road, near Lakeshore, where the other metal junk is piled
- Recently abandoned pickup truck
- Done!!
- #29
- 42.24846, -123.52417
- Off Thompson Creek Road, on Harmon Divide
- Another boat!
- Done!!
- #30
- 42.24765, -123.52625
- Off Thompson Creek Road, on Harmon Divide
- Burnt car over the edge of the ravine
- Done!!
- #31
- 42.24761, -123.52419
- Off Thompson Creek Road, on Harmon Divide
- Very trashed-out RV
- Done!!
- #32 & 33
- 42.24761, -123.52419
- Off Thompson Creek Road, on Harmon Divide
- Two trashed cars with the RV
- Done!!
- #34
- 42.24289, -123.52712
- Off Thompson Creek Road, on Harmon Divide
- Burnt car
- Done!!
- #35, 36, & 37
- 42.24289, -123.52712
- Off Thompson Creek Road, on Harmon Divide
- One burnt/wrecked RV plus two burnt cars
- #38
- 42.22302, -123.50372
- Off Thompson Creek Road, at the very end of Forest Creek Road
- Very old decrepit RV right on the edge of BLM land.
- #39
- 42.26411, -123.55436
- Just off Lakeshore, at the bottom of Thompson Creek Road, at the start of the BLM road to the west
- This might be a couple of really old cars stacked up?? Plus some metal roofing and other metal items.
- #40
- 42.21039, -123.51997
- 20 feet from Thompson Creek
- Burned carcass of an RV, a couple of miles up Thompson Creek Road