The lexicon of road restoration is underdeveloped. The term "obliteration" is common, as is "put to bed." Better terms, with more consistently understood meanings and implications would help. I think we ought to put "put to bed" to bed. What it means is quite variously understood. Obliteration should perhaps be reserved for complete site restoration ala Redwood National Park. Other terms have arisen recently: vacate (yuk), mothball (smelly and toxic), storm-proof, erosion-proof, flood-proof (nifty terms), and my favorite, "decommission." Road decommissioning has a special meaning, distinct from what we've called obliteration, and perhaps closer to "put to bed," but without the imprecision.

Old salt Dennis Harr coined the usage in his recent publication in Fisheries with R.A. Nichols (1993). The FEMAT adopted the term, and hopefully it is on its way into our lexicon.

As with a Navy ship, decommissioning a road means to set up an unneeded-for-now road so that it does not require maintenance and it's potential sediment yield, both chronic and catastrophic, is eliminated or greatly reduced. For most roads, most of the construction investment is preserved, and should we wish to reconstruct, the cost is minimal consistent with long-term watershed stewardship.

A typical decommissioning treatment involves removing culverts, ripping the road surface, removal of unstable fills, and configuration for long-term drainage, which includes measures such as outsloping, waterbarring, ditch removal, and a variety of other site-specific drainage solutions. It does not include full outsloping/recontouring of road sections, unless this is clearly necessary for sediment yield reduction, which is unusual. A decommissioned road is "stormproofed" or we might say it is "hydrologically obliterated," even though the landscape is not restored to near-original shapes.

If it fits with your plans, try using the term, "decommission."

Reference:
Harr, R.D.; Nichols, R.A. 1993. Stabilizing forest roads to help restore fish habitats: A northwest Washington example. Fisheries, Volume 18, No. 4. April 1993. 18-22.