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Privatizing Public Lands Doesn't Mean Building Shopping Centers 07/18/2019Gor Mkrtchian Protected public lands in the United States — including national forests, national parks, and similar areas — cover nearly 500,000 square miles, or 14 percent of the land area of the United States. The existence of these government-controlled lands gives the federal government immense power over much of the United States, and in some US states, the federal government controls a majorityof the land area. Thanks to the popularity of some public lands, known for their natural beauty, federal control of so much land nonetheless remains popular, and the idea of privatizing...

We are visiting Glacier NP, MT. for a couple of days. Any advice from G. NP veterans ?

While this may not produce more than a few ripples on the pond of the global warming discussion, I wanted to point everyone to a great article from our friend Jeff Dunetz that touches on this subject. For some time now (dating back to the Obama administration) there were signs posted at Glacier National Park warning tourists that they would need to snap their glacier selfies quickly because the massive ice formations would all be gone by 2020. Well, it’s nearly the middle of 2019 and not only are the aforementioned glaciers not gone, most of them are actually growing.With...

Against a backdrop of jumbled boulders and spindly trees, former Joshua Tree National Park Supt. Curt Sauer joined dozens of people at a rally in this high desert enclave on Saturday to express their anger over the economic and physical damage caused by the partial government shutdown to the park and the surrounding community. President Trump signed a short-term spending bill on Friday that will reopen the government until Feb. 15. But the 35-day shutdown has already taken a heavy toll on the economy of this dusty refuge for nature lovers, rock climbers and artists at the main gateway to...

<p>Three days after most of the federal workforce was furloughed on Dec. 21, a 14-year-old girl fell 700 feet to her death at the Horseshoe Bend Overlook, part of the Glen Canyon Recreation Area in Arizona.</p>

National parks across the U.S. are facing a number of complications amid the current government shutdown, including excess garbage and illegal activities. Because of the partial government shutdown that has been in effect since last week, employees of the National Park Service haven't been working. At Joshua Tree National Park in southern California, that has resulted in illegal fires, illegal parking and an increase in littering, according to the Los Angeles Times. Rand Abbott, a volunteer at the park, told the Times that he has tried to talk people out of littering and other illegal activity but said that 70...

Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument is a federally protected area found in central southern Utah. Designated in 1996 by President William J. Clinton, it was recently reduced in size by President Donald J. Trump in a proclamation that turned the one large monument into three smaller ones. A long-term, standardized study of the bees had been conducted from 2000–2003, revealing 660 species. The bee communities of the area are characterized by being spatially heterogeneous; most of the bees occur in isolated areas, with only a few being both abundant and widespread. Here we examine what affect the recent resizing of the...

A husband and wife who fell to their deaths from a popular lookout at Yosemite National Park in the United States were taking a selfie, the man's brother says.

In late September, the typically docile Ear Spring geyser in Yellowstone National Park erupted with a forceful blast that shot up to 30 feet of water into the air. Amidst the debris that spewed out of the geyser during the eruption were not only rocks and dirt, but pieces of human-made trash—some of which dates back several decades. Park officials discovered items like a cement block, aluminum cans, cigarette butts, a rubber heel insert, an 8-inch-long drinking straw, almost 100 coins and a baby pacifier from the 1930s, as Brandon Specktor reports for LiveScience. “The water had just washed out...

BILLINGS, Mont. — Yellowstone National Park’s superintendent said Friday that he plans to retire next year from a job he called “the best in the National Park Service” and dismissed speculation that the Trump administration pushed him out for political reasons. Superintendent Dan Wenk told The Associated Press that he decided last fall he would retire in early 2019 after more than four decades with the National Park Service. His seven years leading one of the premier national parks have been marked by an explosion in visitor numbers; tension with neighboring states over wild bison slaughters, wolf hunting and grizzly...

WAYNESBORO — President Trump's national infrastructure plan announced Monday that calls for a $1.5 trillion investment in roads, bridges and the rest of America's crumbling infrastructure, provides for about $200 billion in federal funds. The remainder of dollars would have to come from state, local and private sources. For the Shenandoah Valley, the good infrastructure plan news includes funding to help with the maintenance backlog in the national parks, including Shenandoah National Park, where there is a $56 million maintenance backlog. However, a couple of local government officials and one of Virginia's U.S. senators interviewed expressed doubt about the trickle...

The federal government shut down at midnight Saturday. As you may have noticed, there’s been chaos in the streets, looting from sea to shining sea, electricity outages, all sorts of — oh wait, no, we’re still all fine. That likely has something to do with the fact that the federal government shutting down isn't going to have too much of an impact on most people’s lives. The last time this happened, back in 2013, President Barack Obama realized this. That's why he decided to dramatize the whole affair by shutting down national parks, including the World War II Memorial in...

The government might be shut down Saturday morning, but that did not stop Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke from doing his job. Early in the morning, Zinke could be found cleaning up trash on the National Mall and welcoming tours of schoolchildren to the World War II memorial with a smile. “We’re not putting up barricades,” Zinke told The Daily Caller in an interview. “Absolutely not. We’re passing out brochures until we run out of brochures. I’ll be out here everyday.” Zinke, and much of the federal government, has had the vast majority of staff furloughed due to the government shutdown....

37 quakes -one was 5.3 on the Richter scale- NE of Soda Springs, Idaho (southwest of Yellowstone) in the past 7 hours. Close enough to be of possible concern?) Suspicious action from a fairly quiet area.

The ongoing swarm at Yellowstone National Park is now one of the longest and largest on record. The largest swarm ever recorded was in October 1985; it lasted for three months and included more than 3,000 earthquakes. There was another large swarm in 2010, when more than 2,000 events were recorded over a month. ... As of August 30, 2,357 earthquakes had been recorded. The most powerful in recent weeks was magnitude 3.3; it took place on August 21. The most powerful in the current swarm was a magnitude 4.4, which was recorded on June 15. Yellowstone has had dozens...

YELLOWSTONE REGION (INTELLIHUB) — U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) seismology reports conclude that a massive swarm of earthquakes swept through the park triggering more than 60 separate events in which seismographs spiked to magnitudes of up to 5.0. Friday. Experts fear that the supervolcano is long overdue for an eruption capable of wiping out a vast amount of human, animal, and plant life in the Continental United States. Scientists currently believe that there’s a 10% chance that a “supervolcanic Category 7 eruption” could take place this century, as pointed out by theoretical physicist Michio Kaku who appeared on a segment for...

President Trump will donate his first quarter salary to the National Park Service, White House press secretary Sean Spicer announced Monday. "The president has spoken with counsel and made the decision to donate his first quarter salary to a government entity," Spicer said at Monday's briefing. Spicer handed a check for $78,333.32 for the National Park Service to Interior Secretary Ryan Zinke. Spicer said the paycheck starts from Jan. 20, when Trump took office, until now.

A new legal analysis concludes that President Trump could undo the Bears Ears National Monument. The analysis from the Pacific Legal Foundation finds that a president can revoke a national monument if they determine the areas under protection are "illegally large." The analysis was conducted by Todd Gaziano and John Yoo. From E&E News: Yoo and Gaziano argue, however, that even if a president does not have a "general discretionary revocation power," Trump could seek to revoke monuments by declaring them overly large. "The Congress that enacted the Antiquities Act did not intend monuments of that size to be established...

More than 3.5 million people visit Yellowstone—the jewel in the United States's national park crown—every year. They gawk at the geysers, crisscross the canyons, bond with the bison, and take selfies with the scenery. So far no one, as far as I know, has ever gone to Yellowstone to commit murder, murder most foul. But it's not a bad spot for it! (If you're a murderer—and we don't advocate that you become one.) The park actually contains a narrow corridor less than two miles wide where evildoers could do literally anything, and the law couldn't touch them. Beware when you...

The body of an Oregon man who slipped and fell into a scalding hot spring while he was trying to “hot-spot” at Yellowstone National Park earlier this year dissolved before rescue crews could finish their recovery, according to a recent report. A view of a hot spring at the Norris Geyser Basin at Yellowstone National Park on May 12, 2016. (Credit: Mladen Amtonov/AFP/Getty Images) Colin Nathaniel Scott, 23, was with his younger sister when he walked more than 200 yards away from the boardwalk on June 7 to a hot spring called Pork Chop Geyser. Scott was planning to “hot-spot,”...