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Leave it the way it is. Less is better when nature has done most of the work.
I personally don't think the Forest Service should be building lavish Visitor Centers. If it's worthy of a Visitor Center, it's worthy of National Park status. Either close the thing permanently and let people enjoy it without all the fuss of National Park status, or make it a NM and fund the thing. I was there a few years ago with my son. We had fun without the VC experience.
Volcanoes are skittish things. We're not really preserving anything -- we're temporarily permitted to place a few buildings on its slopes until the next time it goes kablooey. Then Mother Nature reinvents the park all over again and we're back to building more roads and Visitor Centers and parking lots. But then again, it may be a thousand years before the next big one, so who knows...?
-- Jon
Watching, need to check your sarcasm detector and not take my comments too seriously every time (most of the time, but not every time). Sorry to hit your eject button... PS - Your name no longer applies... ;-)
-- Jon Merryman
Thanks everyone for the comments. Without getting into the details, we had run into a situation where we were refused some park information because we were "just bloggers". As you all have found with the new website, and backed up with Kurt's statement in this article, we are really trying to build something beyond "just" a blog. The community participation in the new site has been extraordinary so far, and Kurt and I both feel an obligation to bring quality stories to the site and feed the dialog about park issues.
Andrea, thanks for the video comment! I've got more in the works, including an interview tomorrow, and another request sent in email.
What's in a Name? "A Blogzine by any other name would read so sweet" Whatever you call it, NPT is hot. You have a lot of readers contributing their views on matters pertaining to parks and other public land management issues. Keep on Trucking.
Art
Kurt, you and Jeremy have created a important and informative appendage to understanding the critical issues facing our National Parks today (through your website). I have learned alot about the intricate aspects in how our National Parks are administratively run, ruined, raved and ranted over your website. Some of this stuff you would never find even in the back pages of your local newspaper. I know that I'm free to put my two cents in worth of blog but within respectable bounds, and I thank you for that. Remember, "the pen is mightier then the sword"! Keep up the good work!!
NPT brings attention to parks and issues not covered anywhere else. Thank you for this important work! Oh, and I love Jeremy's videos.
These kinds of events raise questions of compatibility and appropriateness. National parks are our national treasures, deserving respect and treatment as such.
No Merryland the terrorists haven't won, the lies and propoganda about terrorists that is swallowed by the American sheeple has won. The very same outfit dropping bombs on Mesopotamia is the very same one in charge of the national parks. Why shouldn't they fly their jets wherever they want to? You act so surprised. It's a work in progress, if I remember your words correctly. Maybe they'll make a park commerating the Blue Angels someday.
Your faith will be rewarded.
Interesting reading through this, I live in Jackson and yes I saw the Blue Angels do a flyby around 2:50pm Mountain time. We have a few flybys a year by the military mainly because the VP has a house here. The main concern of these flyby's is the safety of the people in the mountains, because the "sound of freedom" can cause rock debris and slides. Luckily and thankfully because of forewarning of the Blue Angels nobody was hurt. That I have heard.
As to Tom
"It is quite obvious that you were never issued a service number.
And you never served.........You have no voice!!"
I have a 4-dig MOS number and your comment is grossly out of place.
The SOG units where a great help in forming the special forces of today, thank you.
Growing up in N.J. and now living on the left coast I've seen to much of nature taken for monetary gains. I feel that if people can't hike or paddle ( in this case ) to enjoy the park without the use of power boats maybe the should stay home and watch it on the nature channel. The sky way sounds like it would be beneficial to the everglades.
"If he get impeached"...lol...you libs are so funni....
O.K., so then we have Dick Cheney as president! Yee-haw!...drop some bombs, babyyyyy!!!
While hanging out in Death Valley, on occasion an f16 will come over a mountain and buzz the valley floor. Although it is very exilerating to watch, I wouldn't want to see that happening on any kind of a regular basis.
I've had the displeasure of seeing military jets fly through the gorge of Grand Canyon, fly under the Chesapeake Bay bridge, and through Misty Fjords National Monument in Alaska. It's disgraceful -- the same attitudes that brought us the military academy mistreatment of women over the years... there's no honour in such behaviour. It just demonstrates that these people can't be fully trusted. When they sign on the dotted line and swear to uphold and protect the constitution and laws of this great land, there's no wiggle room -- no "yuk yuk lookie what I did" -- no "I was just following orders" excuses.
Yes I served, so wipe that nasty thought off your frontal lobe. Drop and gimme 20 while you're at it.
-- Jon
It is quite obvious that you were never issued a service number.
And you never served.........You have no voice!!
"Death to the West and all dangerous free-thinking peoples!"
Signed,
Your Komrads aboard the Al-Morton
-Joseph Stalin, Adolf Hitler, Pol Pot, Kim Jung Ill, Mao Tse Tung, Idi Amin, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad
I guess the terrorists have won. We have to spoil our national parks just to keep up the recruitment effort. Very sad.
NO VOICE???
Wow! I've never played in the NFL, but wow do I have opinions on pro football! Never played pro baseball either, nor have I served in Congress, been POTUS, driven in NASCAR, taught school, been governor or mayor, directed a Hollywood production, been a woman, a catholic priest, a queer, or a muslim terrorist, gotten a hummer in the Oval Office, owned a restaurant, or been a lawyer, but I could go on for hours with opinions on any and all of them. The ship you named and allegedly served on is a US Navy ship, but your parochial, closed-minded, un-evolved stick-your-fingers-in-your-ears-and-scream-'shut-up' attitude makes me wonder which side you were really on. I think the countries where a person can't express opinions are more like North Korea. China. Syria. Iran. Hitler's Germany. (Oh, I have opinions on them too, but have never actually lived in them or served in their governments.)
I don't understand why yer yappin about not being able to drive your ATVs into the canyon when you haven't been there in 23 years!
Anonymous, you didn't mean "Decider-In-Chief", I assume you meant grand Messiah-In-Chief. Anonymous, you forgot one thing, what happens if he gets impeached...your Messiah!?
To: Chair, California Desert District Advisory Council
C/O Bureau of Land Management
6221 Box Springs Blvd
Riverside, CA 92505
From: Packrat
Subject: Panamint Valley, Surprise Canyon
Date: January 29, 2003
I am absolutely disgusted that the BLM, out of Ridgecrest no less, has installed a barrier at the mouth of Surprise Canyon to prevent vehicles from driving beyond the Chris Wicht Camp and on up to Panamint City.
All of this because The Center for Biological Diversity has filled a law suite against the BLM for failure to implement a environmental protection measurement?
What this equates to me is that the BLM has stopped all vehicular traffic from using this
RS 2477 designated road. A Court injunction should be filled immediately against the Center for Biological Diversity, to allow vehicular traffic to use this road to Panamint City, whilst the Environmental Impact Report is being established.
Its like saying the people, with their vehicles, that use this RS 2477 road are GUILTY of using a one hundred year old road and will not be allowed to access Panamint City. The people and vehicles should be allowed to use this road whilst the BLM is preparing the EIR.
Furthermore, for the two sections of the, so-called “stream”, are being considered for designation as a “Wild and Scenic River” are completely ridiculous. Anyone with any notion of common sense would not even think this way. Do you think the general public really believes this? If that were the case then would the California Department of Fish and Game require boat permits to use this so called river. I don’t think so!
Being that The Center for Biological Diversity has filed a lawsuit against the BLM, and the BLM has, in turn, closed off this road to Panamint City, is another classic case of big government closing areas to the general public, let alone the private landowners up in
Panamint City, CA.
In summary I would like to say the following as a matter of public record:
1. I am against the closure of this RS 2477 road going up to Panamint City, which is in the Death Valley National Park system.
2. I am against the BLM for even considering that this “Rivulet” of water would
be even be considered as a wild and scenic river.
3. I am against the Center of Biological Diversity for filling the lawsuit for the
BLM’s failure to produce a EIR, in an efficient manner. This is just another
waste of taxpayer money!
Respectfully,
Packrat
Epilogue: I still stand to this day on what I sent the BLM in the year of 2003
Been up to Panamint City many times, but not after the summer of
1984. The Government, Environmental people, etc., have way too
much to say and keep on locking all of us Desert folk out of the area,
with the exception of walking and enough is enough...
not needed in the parks, if they want to see the park, do it from the ground up.
"I never said the government is the best steward of land, but yes I am dead set against privatization." Leave it to Professor Macdonald to be as clear as mud.
Oh, and I do know the difference between an anarchist and a socialist, since I didn't just fall of the back of the turnip truck yesterday, and I would definitely categorize myself as leaning much more towards the former rather than the latter. I subscribe wholeheartedly to the classical meaning of the word anarchy which is defined in the dictionary as " a theory that regards the absence of all direct or coercive government as a political ideal and that proposes the cooperative and voluntary association of individuals and groups as the principal mode of organized society."
Snowbird the NPS and the military-industrial complex are inextricalbly linked by virtue of their common Decider-In-Chief in Washington, DC. If he and his minions deem the Grand Teton range to be a suitable backdrop to promote the cause of militarism that is totally his perogative. He is after all the Decider and those mountains belong to the gov-mint he runs. So just settle down and enjoy the roar. There ain't nuthin' you can do to stop him. NUTHIN'!
Must of been the later part of the 70's when I was standing atop Echo Rock on the side of Mount Rainier when out of no where a jet came screaming up Russell Glacier.
Scared the crap out of me as I felt the sound push me around.
I gripped the rock so as to not fall off the world.
The pilot waved to me from the cockpit, I waved back.
Later I ranted about the incident at some Rangers, who already knew all about it.
It was quite the experience which I now remember fondly and I will never forget.
I think it is wrong for any flights of any type at any altitude to venture into one of our National Parks.
Beamis, one of these days you'll learn the difference between an anarchist and a socialist. I never said the government is the best steward of land, but yes I am dead set against privatization. Actually, I have trouble seeing much difference between the two choices in your false dichotomy. That's in fact why I raised a disgraceful public use of land, but I was also a little clever to mention the public/private partnership that is the military. It was a way of signaling that the discussion isn't being framed correctly by either pro-government control or pro-privatization forces.
Anyhow, c'est la vie
*sticking my head back in the sand*
Jim Macdonald
The Magic of Yellowstone
Yellowstone Newspaper
Jim's Eclectic World
Beamis and Ricky, knock off the good old boy fly crap. Insn't silence suppose to be golden in the National Parks and not a air corridor for hot rod fly boy's? Ricky, if you get excited and go wee-wee every time you hear jet noise, visit Edwards Air Force base, or the local drag strips and get your charge...but let's keep silence golden in the Nationa Parks.