Yellowstone was striking to me, compared to other national parks and forests I have visited, because of the extensive scale of its man-made development and infrastructure. Environmental management values and practices have evolved significantly over the decades since Yellowstone’s structures were built, with increasing focus on preserving wilderness areas and reducing the footprint and impacts of human activity. This shift has unquestionably helped to protect important and fragile ecosystems and natural treasures for future generations. At the same time, this has also generated some paradoxes with significant implications for the future of how these lands are utilized in the future.
One example of this is the case of the Green Mountain Lookout, a historic fire lookout located in the Glacier Peak Wilderness in Mt. Baker-Snoqualmie National Forest in Washington. Originally built in 1933, the lookout was used to watch for forest fires up until the 1980s. The U.S. Forest Service recently completed a restoration of the lookout, but was sued by Wilderness Watch, a Montana-based activist organization, for violating the Wilderness Act by using a helicopter in its restoration efforts. In June 2012, a federal judge ruled in favor of the suit and ordered the Forest Service to remove the lookout. This prompted a huge outcry from a broad range of local environmental and recreation organizations to save the lookout, and local members of Congress have introduced legislation to keep the lookout where it is. Wilderness Watch, for its part, argues that preserving the restored lookout given the way it was done would set a dangerous precedent for the future preservation of wilderness areas.
A second case, with potentially broader impacts, is the issue of reducing the number of maintained roads in national forests as the Forest Service grapples with the need to reduce costs. In Washington this has generated a vigorous debate between people who want the roads decommissioned in order to preserve designated wilderness areas, and communities and groups that stand to lose important economic and recreational access to these lands if that happens. A recent Everett Herald article on the potential impacts of this debate for the small community of Darrington, Washington, which depends economically on national forest timber harvests and recreational access, highlights some of the complex issues involved.
One element common to both cases is the issue of public access, and who can and should have access to wilderness areas within national forests. A common refrain heard is that national parks and forests are being “loved to death,” with increasing numbers of visitors at a time of shrinking budgets and mounting infrastructure maintenance costs. Ensuring that wilderness areas remain wilderness is a shared goal by all parties concerned. However, in defining narrowly what a wilderness area should be, and reducing the ability of people to experiences these areas—by effectively limiting access to those with the physical ability, time, and income needed to do so—is there risk of potentially losing support for wilderness areas from the broader public?
Image: Fire Lookout at Desolation Peak, North Cascades National Park (Photograph by Basil Tsimoyianis)