Conservationists recently won a round in their fight to curb expansion at Mammoth Mountain Ski Area. In April, a U.S. District Court judge ruled that the Federal Aviation Administration violated federal law when it chose not to conduct a full-scale environmental impact statement on the proposal to expand Mammoth-Yosemite Airport on the east side of […]
Stephanie Tidwell
Posted inJune 9, 2003: How we see the West
County commission stands down on gas wells
Last summer, Colorado’s Delta County Commission made history when it denied state-approved drilling permits for four out of five coalbed methane wells (HCN, 9/2/02: One Colorado County Takes a Stand). The commissioners cited concerns about drilling’s impacts on water quality. But in May, they backed down. County Attorney Brad Kolman says they didn’t have much […]
Posted inJune 9, 2003: How we see the West
Glen Canyon Voices
Glen Canyon is such a compelling intellectual topic because it is full of contradictions: It has been destroyed, and yet a movement is afoot to bring it back … it was a place perhaps equal in grandeur to Grand Canyon, and yet it was dammed and inundated with only the faintest puff of dissent; it […]
Posted inMay 26, 2003: A losing battle
A green light for gas drilling
The Bush administration’s push for increased oil and gas development in the West just got a boost from the Bureau of Land Management. In April, the agency issued two separate decisions that pave the way for 66,000 new coalbed methane wells and 5,000 conventional oil and gas wells in the Powder River Basin by 2011. […]