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Oil and Gas Leases Threaten Nine Mile Canyon

Posted on: November 7th, 2008 by National Trust for Historic Preservation

Truck traffic threatens prehistoric rock art in Nine Mile Canyon. (Photo: Earl Ivan White)

Late last week, media reports revealed a plan by the Bureau of Land Management to sell oil and gas leases in areas of Utah that contain some the nation’s most significant cultural resources, including ancient rock art in the Nine Mile Canyon region. The reports suggested that these potential sales are being conducted with unusual haste in an effort to complete the sales before the administration changes in January of 2009.

While fully detailed maps of the affected areas are not yet available, we have managed to get some additional information on the specific parcels that would be affected. Unfortunately, it looks like they include thousands of acres within Nine Mile Canyon, which many people call the "World’s Longest Art Gallery."

Specifically, the sale contains at least 21 parcels totaling approx. 36,000 acres that are either partially or entirely within the Nine Mile Canyon Area of Critical Environmental Concern (which covers a total of 70,368 acres). Although BLM will sell the leases with No Surface Occupancy (NSO) stipulations - which generally prohibit the lessees from constructing wells, pipelines and other types of oil and gas infrastructure within the boundaries of the leases - BLM will not prohibit or restrain the lessees from using Nine Mile Canyon and its principal side canyons to access project areas on the West Tavaputs Plateau.

So, if issued, the leases will in all probability increase industrial traffic levels in the canyon. This is bad news. As those who have followed this issue know, it is the dust kicked up by heavy truck traffic through the Canyon that is causing damage to the rock art (also harmful are the chemical suppressants that ameliorate some of the dust, but also contribute to the degradation of the rock art).

We will continue to monitor the situation closely, but from what we’ve learned thus far, the BLM’s proposal would further increase truck traffic through the Canyon and dramatically exacerbate the damage to thousands of irreplaceable cultural artifacts.

-- Ti Hays & Virgil McDill

Ti Hays is the Public Lands Counsel and Virgil McDill is the Communications Manager at the National Trust for Historic Preservation.

National Trust for Historic Preservation

The National Trust for Historic Preservation, a privately funded non-profit organization, works to save America's historic places.

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In Memoriam: Dorothy Marie Miner, Preservation Lawyer, Educator, Advocate

Posted on: November 6th, 2008 by National Trust for Historic Preservation 2 Comments

Dorothy Marie Miner (© Historic Districts Council)

Dorothy Marie Miner — preservation lawyer, educator, and stalwart defender of New York City's historic places — died on October 21, 2008. As legal counsel to the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission from 1975 to 1994, Dorothy’s close attention to detail and process protected the Commission, and the historic places it designated, from numerous legal challenges. She played an instrumental role in the court proceedings that eventually led to the U.S. Supreme Court’s 1978 ruling upholding the constitutionality of New York City’s Landmarks Preservation Law, as applied to protect Grand Central Terminal. Later, she played a critical role in a precedent-setting 1990 federal appeals court ruling upholding the City’s preservation law against both takings and Free Exercise challenges brought by St. Bartholomew's Church. That decision remains to this day the leading precedent under the U.S. Constitution regarding the landmarking of historic religious properties. In other important cases, Dorothy helped to defend the City’s effort to protect significant interiors, including a number of Broadway theaters.

Dorothy Miner's successful work at the forefront of preservation law in New York helped to ensure that historic places throughout the country would be protected as a result of the application of local landmark laws similar to New York’s. Paul Edmondson, general counsel of the National Trust for Historic Preservation remembered her work. "Dorothy's fierce defense of New York City's landmarks preservation law had direct national impact. As long as New York's preservation law stood on firm legal ground, other cities and counties throughout the country had strong precedent to support the legitimacy of their own local historic preservation laws." ... Read More →

National Trust for Historic Preservation

The National Trust for Historic Preservation, a privately funded non-profit organization, works to save America's historic places.

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Help Save New Orleans’ Charity Hospital and the Adjacent Mid-City Historic Neighborhood

Posted on: November 4th, 2008 by National Trust for Historic Preservation 43 Comments

Back in May, we listed Charity Hospital and its adjacent Mid-City neighborhood to our annual list of America's 11 Most Endangered Places. The threat is has become even more imminent, and we we need your help. Voice your concerns now to change a potentially disastrous course -- one that would leave this major New Orleans landmark to an uncertain fate, abandon an already-struggling downtown, and destroy at least 18 square blocks of a historic neighborhood.

New Orleans is poised to lose Charity Hospital and the VA Medical Center. The relocation plans of these two institutions call for the needless demolition of more than 165 historic homes -- at least 18 square blocks -- within the lower Mid-City National Register District. Bulldozing this historic neighborhood would not only betray the residents of New Orleans, who are working so hard to rebuild their communities, but could easily be avoided. The rehabilitation of iconic Charity Hospital, and a nearby alternative site for the VA, would avoid the demolition of even a single historic property.

Please act now to help us prevent the needless destruction of historic and cultural resources triggered by ill-advised and short-sighted planning.

National Trust for Historic Preservation

The National Trust for Historic Preservation, a privately funded non-profit organization, works to save America's historic places.

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January Decision May Seal the Fate of Nine Mile Canyon

Posted on: November 4th, 2008 by National Trust for Historic Preservation

The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) will not release the Final Environmental Impact Statement (Final EIS) for the West Tavaputs Natural Gas Full Field Development Plan (WTP Plan) this week as we reported last Friday. Rather, BLM will likely issue the Final EIS sometime in January 2009.

The WTP Plan, a proposal by the Bill Barrett Corporation to construct over 800 natural gas wells on the WTP, could cause truck traffic in Nine Mile Canyon to increase by an additional 500 percent, which would in turn expose rock art panels in the canyon to potentially harmful amounts of dust, chemical dust suppressants and vehicle exhaust. Check back in with PreservationNation in January for additional information on the Final EIS and WTP Plan and ways in which you can express your concerns for this proposal to BLM.

– Ti Hays

Ti Hays is the Public Lands Counsel for the National Trust for Historic Preservation.

National Trust for Historic Preservation

The National Trust for Historic Preservation, a privately funded non-profit organization, works to save America's historic places.

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"World's Longest Art Gallery" Again Under Imminent Threat

Posted on: October 31st, 2008 by National Trust for Historic Preservation 2 Comments

Truck traffic threatens prehistoric rock art in Nine Mile Canyon.

Earlier today, The Washington Post and The Salt Lake Tribune published stories outlining the Bureau of Land Management's December plans to sell oil and gas leases in areas of Utah known to contain some of the nation's most significant cultural and natural resources, including the Nine Mile Canyon region. Unfortunately, this decision represents the latest in a series of moves by BLM to expedite oil and gas leasing and development near Nine Mile Canyon, an area with the highest concentration of rock art sites in the United States that is often referred to as the "world's longest art gallery." In recent years, truck traffic associated with BLM-approved natural gas projects near the Canyon has caused harmful levels of dust and chemicals to settle on the rock art sites. Thus far, BLM has refused to study in detail alternative access routes that would avoid the need for natural gas trucks to use Nine Mile Canyon, even though a September 2008 study funded by the National Trust for Historic Preservation shows that these alternative routes are feasible.

Additionally, we have also learned that BLM plans to issue the Final Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) for the West Tavaputs Natural Gas Full Field Development Plan early next week (West Tavaputs Plateau is the area within Nine Mile Canyon where most natural gas extraction is now occurring). If the BLM's final EIS approves the energy companies' proposals, truck traffic in Nine Mile Canyon could increase by an additional 500 percent.

Once you have digested Tuesday's election results, check back in with PreservationNation for more information on the lease sale and Final EIS and learn about how you can let BLM know of your concerns for Nine Mile Canyon. In the meantime, here's a video shot back in April, showing the damage done to the canyon's prehistoric rock art by truck traffic.