Connecting Past and Present
June 19, 2022 By: Brett Mathews
This article describes how National Parks may have lost their purpose. As seen in chapter 9 of Steinberg’s textbook, the parks were designed with the intent to conserve nature. Well with over 330 million visitors to national parks a year, and some parks having over 5000 a day, is the land really being conserved? Is this helpful for the environment or is it helpful for the “American dream” and capitalism? One thing is clear, this many people in these relatively small areas will not be good for the conservation of that land.
This article makes it clear that companies, as well as the BC government, are following Pinchot’s way of conservation, which is more concerned with efficiency for economic concerns, not the thriving of nature. The article discusses the massive clearcut of old growth forests that occurred in 2021 in Fairy Creek Valley on Vancouver Island. Despite massive protests, this large plot of land made the private logging companies and the provincial government over 1.8 billion dollars. This clear-cut clearly causes many environmental concerns, and if this is how the BC government is going to continue to handle nature there are even more environmental concerns coming our way.
https://thetyee.ca/Analysis/2022/04/14/Looming-Crisis-Facing-BC-Forest-Industry/
Hi Brett!
The idea of National Parks is incredibly ironic as they have become tourist destinations instead of true wilderness areas. The environment is not being helped or protected, as people come from all around the world via fossil fueled transportation (airplanes, cars, RVs, etc.) and support consumerism and commercial goods.
Hey Brett,
Good article. It really shows that sometimes making money and protecting nature is a tough thing to manage. They talk about a situation where old trees were cut down for profit, causing environmental worries. I think that while businesses/governments do need use resources for jobs/the economy, it’s also important to take care of the environment. It’s complex and people should speak up if they’re worried about how things are being handled!