1/11/99
Dear Friends of Yosemite,
The tumultuous seven months since our last Planning Update have
yielded a new and exciting framework for ushering Yosemite Valley
into
the 21st century. In May, the National Park Service will release
for
public review The Draft Yosemite Valley Plan/Supplemental
Environmental Impact Statement reflecting thousands of public
comments
from the past six years with proposed alternatives from four
draft
planning documents. By late 1999, we will finalize this
comprehensive
vision for Yosemite Valley.
It is impossible to overstate how valuable your participation has
been
to date, yet in the next year we will need you more than ever. We
are
constantly reminded that despite its awe-inspiring landscape,
Yosemite
Valley is just a 7 mile by 1 mile sliver of land, much of it
resting
in floodplain or rockfall zones. Any planning decisions we make
to
support and enhance the experience of park visitors and preserve
and
restore the Valley's natural and cultural resources must weigh
the
different, and sometimes competing, values within and begween
these
three issues Interests will collide. In order for us to
make wise
decisions about the difficult trade-offs and best preserve the
park
for future generations, we must fully understand the concerns of
those
who know Yosemite best.
During public discussions on the previous planning documents we
heard
and incorporated a wide range of concerns on all of the major
planning
issues. Nevertheless, before we finish drafting this new
comprehensive plan, we want to ensure we've heard about any
issues
that you think have not already been raised. Hence
there is a brief
scoping process until January 15, 1999. Then, with the
release of the
draft in May, you will have an additional opportunity to have
your
voice heard. What's particularly encouraging is that
Congress's
support provides the means to take all the words and the work and
transform vision into reality. We urge you to note
the key dates
highlighted herein and to stay involved.
As always, thank you for your for your time, your interest, and
your
efforts. Rest assured that you continue to make a difference.
Sincerely,
[signed]
Stan Albright
Superintendent
WHAT'S HAPPENED IN THE PAST SIX MONTHS: A SNAPSHOT
In May, 1998 (the date of our last issue), we were working on a
number
of planning documents simultaneously. Since that time:
* We have read and analyzed over 5000 public comments on the
Draft
Valley Implementation Plan.
* A U.S District court judge issued a preliminary injunction
halting
our proposed work on Yosemite Lodge.
* Based on the full array of public input, we re-thought and
refined
our criteria for making planning decisions in the Valley (see
article
pages on 5-6).
* Based on public input and in discussions with Secretary of
Interior
Babbit we decided to integrate the Draft Yosemite Valley
Housing
Plan, the Draft Yosemite Valley Implementation Plan, the Yosemite
Lodge Development Concept Plan, and the Yosemite Falls Design
Project
into one comprehensive plan for Yosemite Valley. National Park
Service
staff at Yosemite will use all the existing public output and the
revised criteria to prepare the plan.
The rest of this Planning Update is designed to offer more
insight
into these four key developments.
FOUR DOCUMENTS INTEGRATED INTO ONE: THE "NEW"
YOSEMITE VALLEY PLAN
The four existing draft documents summarized below have advanced
Valley planning considerably. The idea now is to use public
comments
combined with the new criteria to examine what was proposed in
these
plans, resolve conflicts between them, and incorporate new
ideas and
concerns that have emerged from the process.
All of these documents are rooted in the 1980 General Management
Plan
(GMP). The GMP was the NPS response to a growing set of concerns
about
conditions at Yosemite. With input from over 60,000 citizens, the
GMP
set forth five broad and intimately linked goals that have helped
guide the planning and management decisions of the park to this
day:
reclaim priceless natural beauty, markedly reduce traffic
congestion,
allow natural processes to prevail, reduce crowding, and promote
visitor understanding and enjoyment.
The Draft Yosemite Valley Housing
Plan/EIS
The Housing Plan, first released in draft form in 1992, was
designed
to implement the GMP objective of removing nonessential employee
housing from the Valley, and to improve housing for NPS,
concession,
and other employees who provide visitor services in the Valley.
The
latest revision of this plan (1996) focused on housing employees
and
administrative offices in El Portal. Destruction of employee
housing
in the 1997 flood lends a sense of urgency to employee housing
considerations.
The Yosemite Lodge Development
Concept Plan/EA
While both the 1980 GMP and the 1992 Concession Services Plan
called
for the removal of Yosemite Lodge buildings from the floodplain,
the
January 1997 flood insisted upon it by destroying approximately
50% of
lodging facilities. Options for the Yosemite Lodge were
originally
part of the VIP, but because of the loss of so many lodging units
and
employee housing in the flood, the NPS decided to accelerate
specific
planning for the lodge so as to return it to full service as
quickly
as possible. The resultant plan did not originally revisit
decisions
about the numbers and types of visitor lodging units made in
previous
plans, but the public process led to the a number of revisions.
The latest draft would have:
* reduced the number of buildings at the lodge as called for in
the
1992 CSP, their footprint, and the total number of acres for
development
* consolidated lodging into quadriplexes, cottages, and motels as
required by the 1992 CSP
* moved cabins into a previously disturbed uplands site north of
the
current Northside Drive, allowing restoration of the Merced River
floodplain and Yosemite Creek delta
* eliminate the current bottleneck of traffic and pedestrians at
the
turn into the Lodge and Yosemite Falls by redesigning roads and
parking areas
* maintained Camp 4 (Sunnyside Walk-in Campground) in its current
location
The Draft Valley Implementation
Plan/EIS
In November of 1997, the NPS released the draft Valley
Implementation
Plan (VIP), which was intended to present a range of approaches
to
realizing the GMP's goals in Yosemite Valley. The VIP developed
four
alternatives with the help of substantial public input, a variety
of
studies, detailed mapping of critical park resources and an
analysis
of park operation functions.
The Lower Yosemite Falls
Restoration Project
The NPS and the nonprofit Yosemite Fund, working under a
cooperative
agreement, are developing this project almost entirely with
private
funds. The project is designed to:
* create a more "natural" area around Lower Yosemite
Falls by removing
cars, tour buses, and asphalt from viewing areas and departure
points
* create a more educational experience through a series of
wayside
exhibits designed to tell the stories of such things as the
park's
natural history, Yosemite Indians, and early pioneers
* make the area accessible for wheelchairs and those with small
children or elderly companions
* create picnic areas that allow visitors to sit, listen, and
take in
both the Falls, and the adjacent forest and views; create
adequate
restroom facilities
----------------------------------------------------------------------
--------------------------------
| The Lodge Lawsuit
| Last October, in response to a lawsuit, the U.S.
District Court
granted a preliminary
| injunction that halted work proposed in the
Yosemite Lodge
Development Concept
| Plan (DCP).
|
| We cannot pretend that our first reaction to the
ruling was
unbridled joy. The judge's
| questions were based, in part, on his finding that
the Lodge plan
may not have
| considered the cumulative environmental impact of
the proposed
construction. As
| such, the ruling played a key role in our
conducting a top to
bottom re-evaluation of
| the opportunities and constraints presented in the
VIP and the
Lodge DCP. That
| evaluation is what convinced us that one
comprehensive planning
document for
| Yosemite Valley ultimately makes the most sense.
|
| Interestingly, the judge's ruling, the stream of
public feedback
and the decision to craft
| one comprehensive plan enabled a sharpening of our
decision-making
criteria and have
| have re-energized both the process and those of us
who wrestle
with park planning
| each and every day.
----------------------------------------------------------------------
-----------------------------------
ISSUES RAISED FROM PUBLIC COMMENTS
____________________________________
|
How Many
Comments?
|Draft Housing Plan (1996)
296
|Yosemite Lodge DCP (1997)
197
|Draft VIP (1997)
about 3400
|VIP Workshops
about 1900
------------------------------------------------------
There were many substantive issues raised during the public
review
process for the previous plans. These ideas are being used
to
formulate and evaluate the alternatives in the Draft Yosemite
Valley
Plan/Supplemental Environmental Impact Statement (SEIS).
You will
have an opportunity, again, to review and comment on these new
alternatives when the draft is released for formal public comment
in
May. A Summary of public comments and NPS responses to
substantive
comments will be include din the SEIS.
To help us right now, we need any new issues that you don't think
have
been raised as yet. Please review the following list of
issues that
we have received comments on and let us know if you have any
issues
that were not brought up yet.
Housing Plan Issues
* General Planning - including 1980 GMP and 1992 CSP goals,
scoping
and public input, NPS responsibility for housing, Yosemite
Institute
needs, use of public funds for housing, sustainable building,
planning
assumptions, community issues, employee health and safety, and
concerns about data presented. Site specific references
included
Yosemite Valley, El Portal, and Wawona.
* Resources - including great gray owl, long-horn elderberry
beetle,
mountain lions, areas of special biological concern, wildlife
habitat
and movement, oak woodland, exotic species, archeological and
historic
resources, hydrology and floodplain, Wild and Scenic River,
scenic
quality, geologic constraints, water, natural and cultural values
of
Riverside.
* Facilities - including infrastructure needs, moving
headquarters,
tradeoffs of building in El Portal rather than Valley, and
substandard
housing.
* Transportation and Circulation - employee shuttle, light
rail, and
parking.
* Economics - including project cost, lease/build options,
affordable
housing, public/private partnerships, environmental justice, and
low
wages and commuting.
* Community and Regional issues - including access to services
and
amenities, schools, sociological impacts, community character,
development density, trailer village, community center, museum,
and
social linkages between communities and Park, county economy and
cost
to county for additional services.
Yosemite Lodge DCP Issues
* General Planning - including fragmented planning, length of
comment
period, interactive contact with public, consistency with GMP and
CSP
goals, range of alternatives, interim and long-term solutions,
carrying capacity, needs of disabled, funding and cost/benefit,
and
tradeoffs between development and resource protection.
* Facilities - including building in undeveloped areas, visitor
lodging-how much and the mix to remove, retain, and rebuild,
types of
buildings, cost, and consistency with GMP and CSP goals.
* Employee Housing - including relationship to Housing Plan, how
much
to retain or rebuild and where, relationship with Camp 4, and
housing
quality.
* Resources - including, floodplain, rock fall zone, air
pollution,
ration of land restored to new land developed, archeological and
historic resources, noise, GIS data, Wild and Scenic River, root
fungus, groundwater, and relative valuing of different natural
and
cultural resources.
* Transportation - including the Lodge gas station,
Northside Drive,
day-use reservations, parking, vehicle circulation around lodge,
central pedestrian way, vehicles in the Valley, buses in the
Valley,
alternative transportation modes, bicycle and pedestrian path
routes,
and traffic at the Yosemite Falls parking lot intersection.
* Camping - including walk-in campsites, no-reservation
camp sites,
contacting campers about planning issues, campfires, and various
campground amenities.
* Climbing - including Camp 4 (Sunnyside Campground), relocation
of
Camp 4, climbing and bouldering.
Valley Implementation Plan Issues
* General Planning - including fragmented planning, range of
alternatives offered, and Valley and Park carrying capacities.
* Transportation - including staging areas, parking areas,
electric
buses and alternative transportation options, hours of operation,
overnight vehicles versus day use vehicles and the concern over
appropriate alternatives for personal freedom.
* Resources - including concerns about bears, ecosystem
fragmentation,
prescribed fire, air quality, hydrology, noise, cultural and
historic
issues such as bridges, orchards and Native American sites.
* Recreation - including opportunities for walking, biking,
hiking,
horseback riding, photography, climbing, hang gliding, rafting,
swimming and the associated issues of access to those activities
both
physically and economically as well as issues of personal freedom
of
choice.
* Facilities - including location of amenities and services,
gateway
community issues, commercial services, visitor centers,
campground
locations, campsite numbers, density of campgrounds, auto
services and
entrance fees.
Yosemite Falls Corridor Plan Issues
This plan had not reached the public comment stage and will be
evaluated as part of the new comprehensive plan for Yosemite
Valley.
DRAFT CONCEPTS FOR NEW ALTERNATIVES
We are currently putting together the elements that will form
altnerative sfor the Yosemite Valley Plan. The following
five concept
statements have been developed to guide the formulation of the
range
of theose alternatives and assist you in providing scoping
coments.
Concept 1
The No Action Concept: maintain current conditions and management
policies; facilities and visitor use areas severely damaged or
destroyed in the January 1997 flood would not be replaced;
approved
General Management Plan (GMP) and Concessions Services Plan (CSP)
actions would be implemented on a piece-meal basis depending on
funding; traffic impacts would be managed through use of the
Restricted Access Plan (gate closures).
Concept 2
Fulfill the Park's purpose by attaining the optimal balance of
GMP
goals: wherever feasible, and to the extent possible, restore,
perpetuate, and enhance the natural, cultural , visitor
experience,
and scenic values of Yosemite Valley by removing, modifying,
reducing,
or relocating facilities and services; regional transit
facilities are
placed in ease-valley (at Yosemite Village), day-visitor parking
in
west-valley, and a vehicle management system is developed.
Concept 3
Achieve GMP goals emphasizing visitor experience and cultural
resource
goals but with reduced natural resource benefits: east-valley
resource
and visitor experience benefits may be obtained by concentrating
regional transit and minimal day-visitor parking in east-valley
and
using a vehicle management system: west-valley impacts are
avoided.
Concept 4
Achieve GMP goals emphasizing natural resource restoration but
with
reduced emphasis on visitor experience benefits: east-valley
resource
and visitor experience benefits are obtained by concentrating
regional
transit, day-visitor parking, and visitor center and theaters in
west-valley and developing a vehicle management system.
Concept 5
Achieve minimum GMP goals: rebuild facilities to approximate
pre-flood
conditions and GMP and CSP numbers to the extent allowed by
minimum
resource, visitor experience, and health and safety goals, and
develop
a vehicle management system and formalized parking in east-valley
but
without facilities for a regional transportation system.
1/11/99
PROFOUND DECISIONS, COMPLEX TRADE-OFFS
When we released the Draft Valley Implementation Plan in November
1997, public and NPS discussions clarified how central the
interaction
between our natural and cultural resource protection goals and
our
visitor experience goals is to Valley planning. In most instances
those goals are complementary. After all, at the most visceral
level,
it is the park's beauty and natural resources that draw people to
it.
Compromising those resources, by definition, compromises the
visitor
experience as well.
Nevertheless, for much of this century, development and use
patterns
in the Valley-cars and their supporting infrastructure, in
particular-have degraded the park's natural resources and set up
conflicts between perceived visitor benefits and natural resource
protection. Public input, months of discussion, and using the
1980 GMP
and NPS mission have enabled us to refine the criteria designed
to
resolve these conflicts.
First, we have established unequivocally that natural resource
preservation will be the most important consideration in all our
decisions. This does not imply that we expect to restore the
Valley to
its original condition - we are striving to protect a natural
system.
It also does not mean that if there is a conflict it
will always be
decided in favor of natural resource protection. What it does
mean is
that each decision will be looked at individually and no
decision
will be looked at individually and no decision will be made
that does
not fully weigh its impact on the highly sensitive natural
resources
that comprise Yosemite Valley and the significant cultural
resources
that comprise our heritage.
As part of that decision, we had to determine which of the
Valley's
natural resources deserved the highest levels of protection. Of
particular importance are resources that are fragile, rare, or
most
capable of sustaining biological diversity. Recent studies have
confirmed that the main component of the Yosemite Valley
ecosystem is
the Merced River and its tributaries, wetlands, meadows, and
riparian
habitat, and that the rich soils and vegetation associated with
these
areas are absolutely crucial for sustaining biological diversity
in
the Valley. Studies have also helped us determine that California
black oak woodlands, whose acorns are a key source of food for
Valley
wildlife, are shrinking and endangered.
Thus the highest value natural resources in Yosemite Valley
include:
* The Merced River
* Biologically rich areas that support a range of species:
wetlands,
riparian, and wet meadow habitats, and California black oak
woodlands
* Rich soil areas that either support or have the potential to be
restored to high value vegetative communities.
In addition to Yosemite Valley's natural resources, the
rich history
of humans interacting with the Yosemite landscape demands that
certain
cultural resources in the Valley be protected as well.
In consultation with historic preservation and Native
American
groups, we have identified three types of historic or cultural
resources that are of particular concern:
* Burial Sites: These sites are sacred to local Indian people,
and
will be preserved.
* Archaeological Sites: Sites that have not been disturbed are
considered most valuable.
* National Historic Landmarks: These sites include the Ahwahnee
Hotel,
the Ranger Club, and LeConte Memorial Lodge
In addition to establishing these high value resources we
also
identified five essential elements of the visitor
experience
necessary to make a trip to Yosemite Valley a lifetime treasure
that
can inspire an individual sense of stewardship in park visitors:
* That natural beauty-derived from the Valley's natural
processes,
dynamic ecosystems, and rich cultural landscapes-must be
preserved.
* Visitors must feel welcome in Yosemite Valley and must, to the
greatest degree possible, have equal access to the Park's natural
beauty.
* We must provide high quality basic facilities and services for
park
visitors.
* We must create a spectrum of opportunities for bringing
individuals
into contact with the Park's natural and cultural environments.
One
example of this spectrum: areas of solitude and quiet must
co-exist
with areas of intense visitor use, such as Visitor Centers.
* We must make available high quality interpretive and
educational
facilities and services for all park visitors.
Laced through all of these priorities, of course, is our
commitment to
protect the safety of park visitors and employees. The GMP
recognized
this and, to the greatest degree possible, called for removal of
all
structures from the floodplain and rockfall zones. The map below
identifies these areas and demonstrates how they dominate a huge
portion of Valley land.
The Devil is in the Details
Establishing criteria is relatively easy. Balancing the thorny
complexities of real decisions and their real-life implications
is an
entirely different matter. We offer the following example to
illustrate.
The NPS knows that it is important for visitors to be able to
spend
the night in the Valley. We know too that a range of
accommodations
are needed, including campsites which some visitors return to and
cherish year after year. But providing the number of
campsites called
for in the GMP raises some conflicting concerns. Is it more
important
to allow camping along the river or to restore environmentally
significant riparian zones and natural flooding patterns that
such
campsites disrupt? Should we place or leave campsites in
dangerous
rockfall zones in order to meet the GMP's recommended numbers?
What
is more important: to maximize the number of available campsites
or to
provide a range of density options so that those who want
relative
solitude can have it, and those who want a camping community can
have
that?
This is just one of many such decisions NPS planners must
confront.
Because the land available for development in the Valley is
severely
limited there must also be tradeoffs between the numbers of
campsites,
lodging facilities, employee housing, other visitor services and
NPS
operations facilities we are able to build., Potentially,
the process
can be rancorous and polarizing. But an informed, fully
engaged
public can help see to it that instead, decisions are made in an
atmosphere of consensus and cooperation.
[see hard copy for "Yosemite Valley Constraints Map"
illustration]
SCOPING FOR VALLEY PLAN UNTIL JANUARY 15, 1999
Three ways to submit your scoping comments:
1. Send a letter postmarked no later than January 15, 1999 to:
ATTN:
Valley Plan, Yosemite National Park, P.O. Box 577, Yosemite, CA
95389
2. Drop us an email message no later than midnight January 15,
1999:
[email protected]
3. On the World Wide Web at www.nps.gov/yose/planning
Over the coming months we will do our best to keep you informed
through these newsletters. You can access additional
information
(fact sheets, etc.) on our planning website (address above).
We will
be seeking more of your comments after the draft plan is prepared
and
released for review, scheduled for May. During this review
we will
host a series of public meetings and will need your comments.