Before the snow begins to fall, members of the Midwest region of theNational Park Service will meet later this week to discuss a monitoringprogram for snowmobile use within the parks. The Great Lakes RadioConsortium’s Shula Neuman reports that this week’s meeting is the ParkService’s first attempt to implement a region-wide monitoring system:
Transcript
Before the snow begins to fall, members of the Midwest Region of the
National Parks Service will meet later this week to discuss a monitoring
program for snowmobile use within the parks. Shula Neuman reports for the
Great Lakes Radio Consortium that this week’s meeting is the service’s first
attempt to implement a region-wide monitoring system.
Although individual parks may have conducted their own studies into how many
snowmobilers are using the trails, until now there has been no unified
attempt to study the issue. Associate Director for the Midwest Region Jim
Loach says the parks service needs to fill in the gaps in its knowledge of
snow mobile use.
“The first thing is to get a handle on exactly what is occurring and what it
is we should be looking at so we can look at a standard that tells us
perhaps that things are fine the way they are, that we need to make some
changes in our management strategies or that different regulations are
necessary.”
Loach says parks service staff will meet with specialists in resource
management, air quality and regulatory measures so a monitoring program can
be put in place by winter. For the Great Lakes Radio Consortium, I’m Shula
Neuman.