Let There Be Dark - Brief Article

AS GOOD AS GOLD

Tucked in the northwest corner of Nevada, the Black Rock Desert and High Rock Canyon look much the same as they did when the forty-niners journeyed through. This landscape of jagged mountains, desert playas, and massive canyons has yielded woolly-mammoth skeletons and still bears the wagon ruts and axle-grease graffiti of the pioneers. Having spent the past decade working to protect the untarnished region, members of Nevada's Toiyabe Chapter scored a major victory last December when Congress established the 1.2-million-acre Black Rock Desert-High Rock Canyon Emigrant Trails National Conservation Area.

The designation allows for mixed uses of the land: Events that take place on the flat, barren playa--like Burning Man, the arts festival and bonfire that attracts 25,000 participants each Labor Day--can continue. But in other, more sensitive areas, which shelter antelope and sage grouse, bighorn sheep and raptors, protections will be stricter.

"Our strategy was to link the wilderness landscape with historic trails preservation," says Rose Strickland, the chapter's public-lands issues chair. The activists added ten wilderness areas visible from the Applegate-Lassen Emigrant Trail, a pioneer route during the gold rush, to their proposed bill. The bold move led historical groups and wilderness advocates to join the fight, and their gamble paid off handsomely: The legislation doubles the amount of wilderness in Nevada, setting aside a total of 757,000 acres. "The essence of the place is wilderness," Strickland says. "From a satellite at night, it's a huge dark space. Its remoteness is awe-inspiring."

* To spotlight Sierra Club activism in your area, contact Elisa Freeling at Sierra, 85 Second Street, 2nd Floor, San Francisco, CA 94105-3441; e-mail elisa.freeling@ sierraclub.org; fax (415) 977-5794.

COPYRIGHT 2001 Sierra Magazine
COPYRIGHT 2001 Gale Group