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The Grand Canyon Is Cold!
A willing Bystander, "The morning after a damn cold night!", Digital photograph, 2007, The Bryan Everett collection, Dahlonega GA.
The Grand Canyon is huge! And there's really no way of describing it that can do justice to what it's like to behold in person. Its one of our nation's most distinctive landmarks, and also one of our oldest national parks. Covering over 1900 square miles, it is hard to imagine that a park of that size could ever be threatened by overcrowding or development. Yet the Grand Canyon and the area surrounding it have a long history of mistreatment; dating all the way back to the late 1800's. "In 1893, Harrison, then as president of the United States, proclaimed the Grand Canyon area a national forest. Inasmuch as mining and other claims within national forests were permissible by law, the establishment of the area into a national forest did not prevent private exploitation.
In 1898 depredations and unlawful seizures of land were reported in the forest." This would go on for years, until finally in 1919; "the Grand Canyon National Park became an established national park, thus finally overcoming all the frustrations of hunters, trappers, miners, grazing interests, water power companies, concessioners, and political sabotage and the like. It is recorded that the obstacles to the creation of Grand Canyon National Park were more numerous than those encountered in any other national park."
Yet even today the Grand Canyon National Park and the ecosystem associated with it continues to be threatened as the tourism industry continues to grow and more and more Americans are free to travel. On average, an estimated 5 million tourists flock to the northern Arizona desert each year to stand on the rim of one of the seven natural wonders of the world every year; a worthy trip. However, that is simply a tidal-wave of humanity that the Canyon's remote desert ecosystem is not meant to deal with. In fact, Human intervention is necessary to protect wildlife from Human intervention; for several years Park officials have struggled to shuffle wildlife around to avoid and accomodate tourists. "An interesting experiment at the Grand Canyon has been the transportation of deer from the North Rim across to the South Rim. ...Of recent years it has become evident that ranger protection and restocking are not sufficient for the complete preservation of the wild animals. While in the parks it is true that the animals live as nearly as possible under primitive conditions, civilization comes close to the park boundaries, modifying the wilderness conditions." But these 5 million people don't just travel alone; with them comes their trash, their air pollution, their noise, and their wallets; the latter of which are eagerly greeted by throngs of cheaply developed commercial enterprises. Somehow, one of America's great natural landscapes has become less natural and taken on the look of a more common landscape: "Grand Canyon National Park suffers from congestion as well. The huge volume of traffic is more than just an inconvenience; there are physical impacts, such as air pollution from exhaust, and there are social impacts that also degrade the overall experience, such as honking horns and blaring radios. The superintendent of Grand Canyon National Park has commented that “we’ve taken this special place that is different from everything in your life and we’ve homogenized it so it’s just like your life. It’s full of cars, you’re constantly looking for parking spaces, you’re standing around in lines.”'
Sources:
-Walter H. Schoewe, "Conservation of Our Natural Areas", Transactions of the Kansas Academy of Science, Vol. 42. (Mar. 30 - Apr. 1, 1939), pp. 59-79.
-Horace M. Albright, "Research in the National Parks", The Scientific Monthly, Vol. 36, No. 6. (Jun., 1933), pp. 483-501.
-"A Cramped Grand Canyon: Plan Aims to Ease Tourist Congestion", The Washington Post, (September 3, 1999), p. A3.
For more info on the Grand Canyon visit: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_Canyon_National_Park
The Grand Canyon Is Cold!
A willing Bystander, "The morning after a damn cold night!", Digital photograph, 2007, The Bryan Everett collection, Dahlonega GA.
The Grand Canyon is huge! And there's really no way of describing it that can do justice to what it's like to behold in person. Its one of our nation's most distinctive landmarks, and also one of our oldest national parks. Covering over 1900 square miles, it is hard to imagine that a park of that size could ever be threatened by overcrowding or development. Yet the Grand Canyon and the area surrounding it have a long history of mistreatment; dating all the way back to the late 1800's. "In 1893, Harrison, then as president of the United States, proclaimed the Grand Canyon area a national forest. Inasmuch as mining and other claims within national forests were permissible by law, the establishment of the area into a national forest did not prevent private exploitation.
In 1898 depredations and unlawful seizures of land were reported in the forest." This would go on for years, until finally in 1919; "the Grand Canyon National Park became an established national park, thus finally overcoming all the frustrations of hunters, trappers, miners, grazing interests, water power companies, concessioners, and political sabotage and the like. It is recorded that the obstacles to the creation of Grand Canyon National Park were more numerous than those encountered in any other national park."
Yet even today the Grand Canyon National Park and the ecosystem associated with it continues to be threatened as the tourism industry continues to grow and more and more Americans are free to travel. On average, an estimated 5 million tourists flock to the northern Arizona desert each year to stand on the rim of one of the seven natural wonders of the world every year; a worthy trip. However, that is simply a tidal-wave of humanity that the Canyon's remote desert ecosystem is not meant to deal with. In fact, Human intervention is necessary to protect wildlife from Human intervention; for several years Park officials have struggled to shuffle wildlife around to avoid and accomodate tourists. "An interesting experiment at the Grand Canyon has been the transportation of deer from the North Rim across to the South Rim. ...Of recent years it has become evident that ranger protection and restocking are not sufficient for the complete preservation of the wild animals. While in the parks it is true that the animals live as nearly as possible under primitive conditions, civilization comes close to the park boundaries, modifying the wilderness conditions." But these 5 million people don't just travel alone; with them comes their trash, their air pollution, their noise, and their wallets; the latter of which are eagerly greeted by throngs of cheaply developed commercial enterprises. Somehow, one of America's great natural landscapes has become less natural and taken on the look of a more common landscape: "Grand Canyon National Park suffers from congestion as well. The huge volume of traffic is more than just an inconvenience; there are physical impacts, such as air pollution from exhaust, and there are social impacts that also degrade the overall experience, such as honking horns and blaring radios. The superintendent of Grand Canyon National Park has commented that “we’ve taken this special place that is different from everything in your life and we’ve homogenized it so it’s just like your life. It’s full of cars, you’re constantly looking for parking spaces, you’re standing around in lines.”'
Sources:
-Walter H. Schoewe, "Conservation of Our Natural Areas", Transactions of the Kansas Academy of Science, Vol. 42. (Mar. 30 - Apr. 1, 1939), pp. 59-79.
-Horace M. Albright, "Research in the National Parks", The Scientific Monthly, Vol. 36, No. 6. (Jun., 1933), pp. 483-501.
-"A Cramped Grand Canyon: Plan Aims to Ease Tourist Congestion", The Washington Post, (September 3, 1999), p. A3.
For more info on the Grand Canyon visit: en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grand_Canyon_National_Park