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The Bureau of Land Management has released a proposed management plan for Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument that emphasizes conservation. The BLM is required to develop a monument management plan by President Joe Biden's restoration of the monument to its original size in October 2021, following former President Donald Trump's illegal reduction of the monument in 2017.
The preferred alternative in the final environmental impact statement would break the national monument into four management zones: the front country zone, passage zone, outback zone, and primitive zone. The outback zone would limit development across 558,700 acres while allowing motorized travel on designated routes. The primitive zone would provide an “undeveloped, primitive, and self-directed visitor experience without motorized or mechanized recreational access" on over 1.2 million acres.
The plan would also establish a new “area of critical environmental concern,” or ACEC, covering 54,000 acres in an area that “contains the highest density of cultural sites” within the monument. It also emphasizes fostering “Tribal involvement in the land use planning process."
Wilderness Act turns 60
President Lyndon Johnson signed the Wilderness Act into law 60 years ago this week. The law defines wilderness as a place where, “in contrast with those areas where man and his works dominate the landscape … the earth and its community of life are untrammeled by man, where man himself is a visitor who does not remain.”
Since its passage, Congress has used the Wilderness Act to designate around 750 wilderness areas in the United States that protect 111 million acres under the highest level of public land protection.
The Biden administration celebrated the beginning of Wilderness Month with a proclamation touting the President's conservation achievements, including the conservation of more than 41 million acres of U.S. lands and waters.
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For all of its blind spots and shortcomings and idiosyncrasies, the Wilderness Act remains as relevant as ever. If anything, the long reach of civilization makes the wilderness ideal even more valuable than when the act was written. On its 60th birthday, the Wilderness Act is important not despite the fact that we live on a garden planet—but because of it.”
