Something of note about this road:

In the winter, it's closed off at almost every entrance with gates, preventing most vehicles from entering. Gates of course only stop obedient people, so occasionally people still get around them.

This past winter I was out for a drive with my wife and we're aware of a legal, numbered road that enters the area and does not have a gate. The road itself is impassable to anything on street tires in the winter but can be done in a well-considered 4x4 on appropriate tires, by an adult operator without damaging the route.

So we headed out there to fool around - assuming we'd have the whole place to ourselves. As we rolled up we saw a sedan hopelessly stuck in the snow and four excited kids (I guess around 18 or 19) who had bypassed the gates on the main road and managed to drive all the way back to the cave parking area before becoming stuck. They had been out there for hours, there were no other tracks in the snow and it had clearly been days since anyone else had been back there, legally or not. It was in the teens (temperature, Fahrenheit) and they had no blankets, didn't look like they had any food, they weren't equipped to spend the night out there at all.

We easily towed them out with a strap and I can only assume they made it home after they were back on the more compacted snow of the main road..

But, because the area is closed off they had no reasonable expectation that anyone would be along to rescue them. It's at least several miles walking in the snow to get to civilization. The road closure could have put these kids in danger by virtue of an attractive nuisance and no legal traffic to provide help when needed. It was their lucky night that my wife and I knew a legal ungated route back there because even when I disagree with a closed gate I don't drive around them. (I guess it could be argued that exploiting a different route to enter an otherwise closed area is the same thing, but it's not my responsibility to tell them they didn't gate that road)

Generally I'm sick of all the closures everywhere all the time. I've been a lifelong outdoorsman and I've seen every sort of litter and vandalism mankind can dish out, but by far the ugliest and most disgusting litter and vandalism comes in the form of fences, gates and signs that say "NO".