It is perfectly legal to shoot outside of the 'safety corridor' up Tinkham Road. The pit is easy enough to find that you don't need a map. Take the exit, hang a right, then a left at the fork about a mile down. The road literally ends at the pit. The car's gone from the pit thanks to some good samaritan. On the way up to the pit, you'll see 'no shooting' signs on the side of the road. The 'safety corridor' is basically 200 yards either way from the side of the freeway. There's a 'now leaving safety corridor' sign on the way up to let you know it's legal to shoot. There's a few spots that people have stopped at to shoot into the hill side before the pit. While most have a good back stop, I still recommend going all the way to the pit. It's the best place to shoot for sure.

And yes, you do run into idiots up there. Last time me and a few buddy's were up there, we were in the middle, couple guys to our left, and a small group to our right. The guys on our left wanted to set up targets on the far side of the pit so we yelled for a cease fire. The group to our right looked over, clearly acknowledging that we yelled for the cease fire. So the couple guys on our left go to set up the targets and we're just watching, bsing at the line as our targets were already set up. All of a sudden, the group on our right starts shooting while the guys are still out there. Obviously figuring that since they were in the far side of the pit, it was okay to shoot. So we yelled cease fire again, and again, they look over, acknowledging we yelled for the cease fire. They stop long enough for us to turn back around and then start shooting again.

The guys to our left were cool about it, but that's still completely unacceptable. So every time after that whenever any of us went out on a cease fire, we took a loaded gun with us and kept it in hand. Needless to say, the douche bags on the right side of the pit got the point and set all their guns down during the rest of the cease fires.

Some people just shouldn't have guns.

That's why I won't go shooting with complete strangers. And I OC a loaded handgun while up at gravel pits. Never know when someone might try to rip you off or something.

Yeah, I always OC when I'm up in the pit. Somebody wants to shoot my pistol, they're welcome to. Then I'll just wait at the line with a loaded gun in hand. Never go un-armed around strangers when you're up the mountain. One of my personal rules.

So is the Tinkham Rd pit open again? I thought that it was recently posted as "No Shooting".

What's up?

Tinkham Pit is CLOSED!

http://www.fs.usda.gov/wps/portal/fsint ... &%20Events

As a (EX) avid mountain biker, I'm sad to see that pit closed with the reason being a new trail system.

I just heard a rumor two weeks ago that Tinkham had been closed... honestly I did not believe the source. Wow, this sucks.

To the administrators charged with the responsibility of maintaining the Federal Forest as a national treasure for all Americans: up yours.

If anybody would like the names and e-mail addresses of the people directly involved and accountable for the closure let me know, we worked with them on multiple occasions trying to find an alternative up off I-90 to no avail...