Original image stolen from USDA Forest Service, then edited.
(1) A level area created by cutting into a slope and adding a retaining wall.
Since the soil exposed by this is already compacted, the level area created is generally more stable than if it was created by laying in fill.
A cut slope is a manufactured form of the stream version, which is a cut bank, but a bank is usually all-natural (no sweaty work needed).
(2) This is a hillside hack, created by placing a trail inside the landscape by removing some of what was there originally. Do that and you get something like this, a cut slope. Produced by cutting, eh?
The point is to make a firm, level surface to walk on, which a slope doesn't have, and which you also don't get by just piling dirt onto a slope, even if you do it carefully.
You gotta go and hack and chop and cut that sucka down into the slope, and you gotta know what you're doing.
And when you're done you have a cut slope and you can walk there, and that's just exactly right. It's now a trail. Congratulations, you.
Have anything worth adding? Then try sosayseff@gmail.com
Me? Cutting and hacking? Me? Get real.
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