File photo of walkers on Tumamoc Hill.
Those who love to walk on Tumamoc Hill should consider themselves warned: Start wearing a mask or the hill may close to visitors.
Officials at Tumamoc Hill are asking walkers in the evenings to wear their masks. Ben Wilder, the director of the Tumamoc Hill Desert Laboratory, said about 40% of people wear masks in the evening, while around 70% of those in the morning mask up. If this trend continues, he said the hill may have to close again.
Wilder said with 50 to more than 100 people walking the hill during peak hours, it's necessary to wear masks because staying six feet away from someone isn't always possible.
"The bigger trend in the evening that we're seeing is that people often do have masks on them, but they're down below their chin, over on ear, on their wrist, and they're just not wearing them as they hike," Wilder said. "They're not doing any good, if they're not over your nose and mouth."
The University of Arizona, which manages Tumamoc with Pima County, issued a press release before Thanksgiving begging more walkers to mask up. Over the last three weeks, mask wearing has increased marginally in the evening crowds by about 10 percentage points, but it's not enough.
He said that if mask wearing percentages don't increase, the popular exercise location may close down in an effort to mitigate the spread of COVID-19, especially since new daily case counts were recently booming in Pima County.
"It could be early next week that things have to shut down. It could be two weeks from now. It could be never, right? That's hopefully the case, that we're actually able to get this under control," Wilder said.
He said that if those holding their masks would put them on, the evening numbers would be almost comparable with the morning numbers.
The Pima County Health Department is stationed at the bottom of the hill during evenings and peak hours, giving out free masks and promoting mask wearing.
"I think all of us are on notice. The actions and steps that we take day-to-day right now directly impact what happens in the future," Wilder said.
Wilder discussed the need for increased masking at the hill during Arizona's spike in cases this summer. Overall, 30% to 40% of walkers in July were masking up.
After threatening to close down, the university reported in August that mask wearing among morning walkers increased by almost 50 percentage points to 70% of walkers masking — an effort that kept the hill open. Only about half of the evening walkers decided to mask at that time.
According to the release, Wilder said that if the decision had rested solely on the evening walkers, officials would have closed the hill.
The biodiversity center partnered with The Cream Shop to create a mask with different animals and plants common to the area.
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