Appendix B

Department of Parks Grand Canyon Initiative

Articles supporting general discussion:

Note: Sky Train has attempted to not only to satisfy the Department of Parks requirements but also the requirements of the other concerned constituents and public at large!

As Published in the St. Petersburg Times, Florida

on November 26, 1997 sec 3A. Associated Press

TIMES - WEDNESDAY, NOVEMBER 26, 1997

THE NATION

Parks want visitors, not cars

Associated Press

WASHINGTON -- Most cars would be banned from Grand Canyon, Yosemite and Zion national parks under a plan announced Tuesday to relieve overcrowding. Visitors would ride buses and light rail systems instead.

"The problem isn't too many people, it's too many cars," Interior Secretary Bruce Babbitt said of the crowding in many major national parks.

The government doesn't agree with proposals to limit visitors to the parks, he said." We must keep the welcome sign out." But starting in 2000 in Grand Canyon and Zion and 2001 in Yosemite, that welcome won't include the family car.

And, Babbitt added, the changes at those parks will be considered a blueprint for other national parks, such as Acadia in Maine and Golden Gate in San Francisco.

Jay Watson of the Wilderness Society welcomed the announcement. "With millions upon millions of Americans flocking to the parks it's clear that we need to do something to ensure a pleasant visitor's experience well into the next century, and this will accomplish that," Watson said.

Babbitt and Transportation Secretary Rodney Slater signed a memorandum for their departments to cooperate in the develop-ment of mass transit systems for the parks.

Along the South Rim of the Grand Canyon the sound of the wind in the pine trees has been replaced by the rumble of engines and the scent of fumes, Babbitt complained. So autos will be banned from that road, and parking lots will be built outside the park.

Light rail lines will run 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, Babbitt said, carrying up to 4,000 visitors an hour to a new visitor center. The department is looking for a developer to build the rail system, estimated to cost $67-million.

In Yosemite, Babbitt said, a system of shuttles will bring visitors from surrounding. towns, with parking lots and some park roads being eliminated. The plan for Zion also calls for a ban on cars, with shuttles bringing visitors from nearby Springdale.

A new railway book titled "GO-Transit, A Historical Review" by Wilfred Sergeant, now VP, Planning and Operations for Sky Train.

A recent update on the system; click here

The Book

The subject is the inside story of the planning, construction and inauguration of the rail commuter service in Toronto that the Government of Ontario negotiated for Canadian National Railways to build and operate, in the name of GO-Transit.

The purpose of this book (now in draft form) is to present an outline and supporting data for the information of the reader. The text runs to 128 letter-size pages and 160 photographs, many of which are original, never published before.

As the memories of each new personality are introduced into the text, there is a brief outline of how that person came into that responsibility, including background and previous experiences. The above repeats the text on Appendix B.

A larger elaboration can be seen on this link.

Injuries by Light Rail at Grade!

by Kim Pedersen President of the Monorail Society

Abbreviated version follows:

Death isn't the only unfortunate result of light rail accidents. Injuries abound and entire systems come to a grinding halt when there is an incident. Service interruption equals an unreliable mode of transit, versus monorails often-achieved 99.9% reliability. Here are further statistics from California in 1998...

California Light Rail System	Number of Accidents	Killed (real people)	Injured (real people)
LA Metro Blue Line	14	8	5
Sacramento	2	1	1
San Diego Trolley	8	4	4
Santa Clara Valley	7	2	5
San Francisco	7	2	5
Totals	38	17	19

Even the Los Angeles Metropolitan Transit Authority admits that light rail "introduces the potential for collisions to occur between motorists, pedestrians or bicyclists and the train." According to an article in the LA Times, the MTA pays local police tens of millions of dollars to patrol the Blue Line tracks and finances special motorcycle enforcement teams to catch motorists driving through signals or pedestrians running through them.

Link to the Monorail societies (tMs) full article!

Fund for Animals Calls for Ban on

Snowmobiles, Snowcoaches, and Trail

Grooming in National Parks

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE:

Monday, November 15, 1999

CONTACT:

D.J. Schubert, 602-547-8537, schubertaz@aol.com

Andrea Lococo, 307-859-8840, alococo@wyoming.com

SILVER SPRING, MD -- Today, in response to the unacceptable alternatives contained in the National Park Service’s Draft Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) for winter use activities in Yellowstone and Grand Teton National Parks and the John D. Rockefeller Memorial Parkway, The Fund for Animals announced the development of its own independent alternative: The Natural Regulation Alternative.

The Natural Regulation Alternative calls for: (1) a prohibition on snowmobiles, snowcoaches, and trail grooming in the parks; (2) restrictions on road plowing; and (3) the development of an elevated monorail system to facilitate public use of the parks with fewer environmental impacts. It is the only alternative that protects park wildlife in a natural state, restores the ecological integrity of the parks, and is consistent with the National Park Service’s legal mandate to preserve the parks in an unimpaired condition for the benefit of future generations.

Link to the full article.

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