Re[2]: [at-l] OT Cost to Enter National Parks May Go UP

[Bob C." <ellen@xxxxxxxxxx (Bob C.)]

>"...a bad chain reaction: Harvey+Colin+book=30-40,000 hikers." says Alex.

This is always a dilemma. Does publicity help or hurt the special outdoor
places? Some of us who know Maine's so called 100-mile-wilderness were upset
when Backpacker Magazine featured the area a few years ago. We rightly feared
the crowds the magazine would bring. I had the same misgivings 25-years ago when
I wrote about Gulf Hagas and Bigelow and the St. John River -- three of my
favorite places in this world.

But the 100 miles was not wilderness. Critical sections were only a 200-foot
wide walking easement through a private commercial forest. Last year the Nature
Conservancy purchased 40,000+ acres in the area and easements on a couple of
hundred thousand of additional acres. Would this have happened had not
Backpacker focused attention on this incredibly beautiful area? No one will ever
know. But people generally will fight to protect only those areas they know and
love.

My Bigelow stories were criticized for drawing attention to a beautiful wild
mountain. But I like to think they may have helped when a couple of years later
developers proposed turning the mountain into a four season "Aspen of the
East."

The referendum that snatched the mountain from the hands of the developers
passed by only a few thousand votes. Did my many stories help achieve the margin
of victory. No one will ever know. But I like to think so.

Some similarly criticized my Gulf Hagas stories. But a few years later the
National Park Service bought the area. It became a "National Heritage Preserve"
or something like that -- the first significant federal purchase ever in the 10
million acres of Maine wildlands. Again. Was there a connection? I have no idea.
But it's nice to think so.

The St. John, which flows for 125 miles through northwestern Maine before it
passes under its first public road, was proposed to be dammed during the last
energy crisis in the 1970s. 60 miles of the river, including its wildest rapids
would have been turned into a giant lake.

Maine's Governor, Legislature and the entire Congressional Delegation favored
the dam. Environmental groups were luke warm in their opposition. But somehow
the dam was defeated. I like to think years of publicity may have helped.

Weary