BETHEL — Imagine climbing Mount Katahdin on a nice summer day. You scramble up to the top and are greeted by 30 other people snapping pictures and admiring the sweeping view. Wilderness paradise or overcrowded tourist stop?

Such scenarios were the center of debate at the 31st biennial meeting of the Appalachian Trail Conference, the private nonprofit group that oversees the 2,150-mile trail from Georgia to Maine.

The theme of this year’s national conference, which began this weekend at Sunday River Ski Resort, was “Loving the Trail to Death.”

Opinions on the issue were as diverse as the license plates in the resort’s parking lot. Nearly 1,400 people attended the meeting, most of them from the 14 states that are crossed by the Appalachian Trail, but some from as far away as Indiana and Texas.

“The AT isn’t and hasn’t been a place for wilderness solitude,” said Jim Gorman, senior editor for Backpacker magazine, speaking at a Saturday seminar on promotion of the trail. “Part of that is by design and part of that is by location.”

The trail, which traverses much of the East Coast, is within easy reach of two-thirds of the nation’s population.

Dana Thurston of Yarmouth hiked the trail from its beginning atop Springer Mountain in Georgia to its end at the summit of Mount Katahdin — known as thru-hiking — in 1991. One of the small number of through-hikers who use the trail annually, he said he was disappointed when he began by the number of people he encountered on the trail. He said he went seeking a solitary adventure and realized that wasn’t going to be the case. Toward the end of the trail, in his home state of Maine, he said, he finally found his solitude.

The Maine advantage

Although overuse is a concern on some portions of the trail in Maine, by and large the state’s section has remained closest to the wilderness footpath envisioned by the trail’s founders in 1921.

The Maine segment of the trail is “magnificent,” said Ed Garvey, who in 1990 at age 75 hiked the entire trail for a second time. Although the Maine portion of the trek is the most difficult, traversing several mountain ranges and rising a cumulative 11,000 feet, it is among the best, Garvey said in an interview.

The most heavily used sections of the trail in Maine are in the Mahoosuc Range along the New Hampshire border, from Route 4 to Piazza Rock near Saddleback Mountain, the area around Bigelow Mountain in Carrabassett Valley, the Gulf Hagas area near Brownville and the trail’s final miles in Baxter State Park.

“We’ve got spot use in Maine that is causing us real problems,” Dave Field, chairman of the Appalachian Trail Conference and a resident of Hampden, said in an interview after Saturday’s seminars on trail overuse. He said the conference and the Maine Appalachian Trail Club are already working hard by building bog bridges and rock steps in the high-use areas to make sure the trail is not further damaged by frequent use.

“Overuse may be the price of success,” said Herb Hartman, deputy director of Maine’s Bureau of Parks and Lands, which oversees 96 of the trail’s 280 miles in Maine. But he hasn’t heard a lot of complaints about overuse of the AT, he said in an interview.

Perhaps the trail can borrow from the state’s current tourism motto: Maine, the way the Appalachian Trail should be.

Managing the crowds

Opinions on how to curb overcrowding of the trail were diverse. One seminar focused on the use of side trails to disperse hikers along the popular AT. While some feared such trails would increase use of the AT, others welcomed the idea of connecting trails.

Kevin Peterson, the New England Regional representative for the Appalachian Trail Conference, reminded those at the seminar that the AT’s founder, Benton MacKaye, envisioned a network of trails with the venerable Appalachian Trail as its backbone.

One such trail that was at first shunned but is now welcomed by AT officials is the International Appalachian Trail, which is proposed to extend from Mount Katahdin to the tip of the Gaspe Peninsula in Quebec. Nearly 200 miles of the trail from Mars Hill to Kedgwick, New Brunswick, are already completed. Other unconnected portions of the trail have been completed in New Brunswick and Quebec. Problems acquiring land in Maine have slowed the trail’s progress in this state. The entire trail is slated to be finished by 2000.

Another prickly suggestion was limiting the size of groups that could use the trail. This raised some conference attendees’ ire because turning away people may lessen support for the trail — political, financial and physical (such as volunteering to maintain the trail or build privies).

“Whatever is done to cope with overuse should not deprive those who haven’t yet experienced the trail the opportunity to do that,” said Brian Eliot Burke, deputy undersecretary for natural resources and environment in the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the conference’s keynote speaker.

“If I hadn’t hiked on the trail, I would have been an ichthyologist,” said Burke, a native of Cambridge, Mass., who frequently hiked the trail as a teen-ager and is now a top-level advocate for the evironment.

Looking out on the crowd gathered in a large ballroom for Saturday morning’s speeches, several speakers, including Dave Startzell, executive director of the Appalachian Trail conference, commented on the preponderance of gray and balding heads. Startzell, who himself is gray and balding, said the conference and the regional clubs need to attract younger people to the trail so they will take over its upkeep.

“Now more than ever we must be willing to share this resource,” he said.

One thing most could agree upon is that balancing promotion of the trail while guarding against overuse will remain problematic. But the AT’s popularity shouldn’t be viewed as all bad.

“There are many parks that have problems far greater than having too many Vibram-soled friends,” said Backpacker’s Gorman, referring to a brand of rubber soles frequently used on hiking boots.

Another concern is protection of the trail from development. Federal, state and county governments and other public entities over the years have bought land along the trail to provide a corridor of protection. More than 97 percent of the trail’s length is now protected and the U.S. Forest Service and Park Service are working to buy land along the remainder. Burke, who oversees these agencies, pledged to the group that the land acquisitions would be completed and the entire trail would be protected by 2000.

All but 2 1/2 miles of the trail in Maine are protected by state and federal agencies. The sole area that is still under private ownership is along Saddleback Mountain. Negotiations to buy the land from the ski area have been contentious but are ongoing.

In addition to two days of meetings and seminars, conference participants will get out and enjoy Maine’s outdoors. The remainder of the week is filled with hundreds of hiking trips along the AT and other trails. Backpacking, canoe and bike excursions are planned. Workshops throughout the week will cover such things as choosing the right pack, hiking with children and building the perfect privy.