Volume 13, January 1999

"When we try to pick out anything by itself, we find it hitched to everything in the universe."
     John Muir, My First Summer in the Sierra, 1869
 

There were many substantive issues raised during the public review process for the previous plans.  These iadeas 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 relased for formal public comment in May.  A summary of public comments and NPS responses to substantive comments will be included in 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 youhave any issues that were not brought up yet.

Housing Plan Issues

• General Planning - including the 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 resourcces, hydrology and floodplain, Wild and Scenic River, fishing, 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.
• Economies - 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, social linkages between communities and Park, county economy and cost to county for additional services.

• 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, ratio 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.