dave54 wrote:
adambeck7 wrote:
Comments like that of azdryheat seem so strange to me. National Forests and Parks were created to preserve their natural beauty, not to create a playground for dirt bikes, speed boats and RVs. I'm hoping to god that these public treasures never become privatized and developed.
The National Forests were created to facilitate rural economic development while protecting forested watersheds.
They were not created to protect from logging, but to increase logging to benefit local communities, under the oversight of professional foresters who would harvest timber while protecting and maintaining the values. Multiple use is mandated by law. Wood, water, forage, wildlife, and recreation are supposed to be given equal weight.
National Wildlife Refuges were created for hunting.
National Parks exist to preserve the natural features while simultaneously providing for public access and enjoyment. That is in the National Parks Organic Act.
Read Teddy Roosevelt's autobiography for his own words on why he created National Forests and other public lands. He never intended public lands to be locked up like a museum, look but don't touch.
Public access and enjoyment, yes, but it also says: "by such means and measures as conform to the fundamental purpose of the said parks, monuments and reservations, which purpose is to conserve the scenery and the natural and historic objects and the wild life therein and to provide for the enjoyment of the same in such manner and by such means as will leave them unimpaired for the enjoyment of future generations."
I'm all for allowing people to enjoy the land, they're far from "locked up", especially the national forests. Leaving them in tact for future generations doesn't involve creating developed campgrounds nor using motorized vehicles wherever you may please as azdryheat said. I also don't think Roosevelt could've imagined millions of people visiting these forests and driving ATV's all over.
Speaking of what Roosevelt intended "In the Grand Canyon, Arizona has a natural wonder which is in kind absolutely unparalleled throughout the rest of the world. I want to ask you to keep this great wonder of nature as it now is. I hope you will not have a building of any kind, not a summer cottage, a hotel or anything else, to mar the wonderful grandeur, the sublimity, the great loneliness and beauty of the canyon. Leave it as it is. You cannot improve on it. The ages have been at work on it, and man can only mar it."
"It is also vandalism wantonly to destroy or to permit the destruction of what is beautiful in nature, whether it be a cliff, a forest, or a species of mammal or bird. Here in the United States we turn our rivers and streams into sewers and dumping-grounds, we pollute the air, we destroy forests, and exterminate fishes, birds and mammals -- not to speak of vulgarizing charming landscapes with hideous advertisements. But at last it looks as if our people were awakening."
I'd say he most definitely cared about conservation of these lands as they are.
